


Unmask (How Fragile We Are)

by angelzoo (shades_0f_cool)



Category: Deadpool - All Media Types, Marvel, Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Banter, Body Worship, Bottom Peter Parker, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Eventual Sex, Feels galore, First Kiss, First Time, Fluff, Hurt Peter Parker, Hurt Wade Wilson, Hurt/Comfort, Insecurity, M/M, Making Out, No Deadpool Thought Boxes, Pining Peter, Porn, Romance, Self-Esteem Issues, Sexual Humor, Sexual Tension, Sharing a Bed, So Much Touching, Top Wade Wilson, Wade Being Wade, unmasking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-01
Updated: 2019-08-11
Packaged: 2019-11-07 16:10:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 22,969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17963795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shades_0f_cool/pseuds/angelzoo
Summary: It’s the third time this week, and Peter still doesn’t know why Wade keeps using his apartment as his own personal sick bay.What he also doesn’t know is why Wade is getting so goddamned sweet whenever he’s hurt.Or why Peter likes both of those things so much.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [emmabeth](https://archiveofourown.org/users/emmabeth/gifts).



> B, you’re the best person I know and I’m beyond grateful to have you in my life. So, on that note: here’s a tiny little gift for you. I hope you enjoy! <3

_Fucking finally_.  

     After tossing and turning for what feels like the better part of eternity, Peter has finally managed to fall into an almost decent kind of sleep. If one discounts the recurring nightmares, PTSD, waking up screaming and bathed in sweat, that is, because that’s Peter’s version of decent. Anyway, the point is, he’s asleep—or as close as he’s going to get these days—and all it took to make it happen was spending three nights in a row out on the hunt for Vulture and his henchmen, and then battling all of them.  

     At once.  

     If there’s one thing Peter sucks at, it’s taking care of himself, especially where his sleep routine is concerned, and— _surprise_ —it’s starting to show. He’s gotten sloppy during fights, sustained injuries that could have been avoided. It had only been a matter of time until things would come to a head, and then bingo, turning point unlocked. He’d uselessly stumbled into an attack he’d have usually seen coming from a mile away, resulting in a cut the size of Avengers Tower on his chest and yet another disposal of one of his precious suits. On his way home from Central Park, he’d almost swung headfirst into a solid brick wall (twice), then dozed off in the middle of crawling up the wall to his apartment, so yeah—he figures it’s probably high time he get some much-needed shut-eye to refuel his batteries.  

     He’s in the middle of doing his habitual almost-but-not-quite-sleeping, when his Spider senses tingle and there’s a faint scratching against his window. Where his usual, superhero-y self would be up and ready to fight in a heartbeat, his hopelessly exhausted self takes a full minute to even move a damn muscle, just long enough for it to be too late. The window slides open and there’s a loud _thunk_ when something hits the floor below the windowpane.

     Peter holds his breath. Please let it be something harmless, like . . . a cat. A highly intelligent cat who’s able to climb thirty-two stories and hoist windows.  

     “Heya, Petey! How’s it hangin’?”  

     Okay, yeah. That’s not a cat. Wade might have certain characteristics of a cat down—namely, the asshole part of one—but he’s decidedly not as fluffy.

     Peter would have groaned if he’d had the energy. As it is, he barely conjures enough of his depleted reserves to blink open an eye.

     Only to regret it about 0.01 seconds later.

     For some inexplicable, undoubtedly outrageous reason, Wade isn’t wearing pants. There’s also the tail end of a hunting knife sticking out of his chest. It’s the knife that gets Peter to sit up, despite the fact that every last bone in his body is screaming at him to stay down.  

     “Wade? Oh my god, there’s a knife—”  

     “—in my chest, yes.” He waves a hand through the air as if it’s nothing and okay, this is Wade, but still. “This cute little addition to my collection has proven to be extremely useful.”  

     Peter gapes at him. It’s only now that he’s looking properly that he notices a takeout bag from Leo’s dangling from the knife. What the hell?  

     “Wade, how—”  

     “— _amazing_ is that, right?” Wade gushes. What also gushes is the freaking _stab wound_ in his chest. Peter’s twitching with the urge to get over there and help. He’s _always_ twitching with the urge to help, no matter how many times Wade ends up on his doorstep all battered and bruised, barely breathing and slowly fading away. So okay, this might be Deadpool and fine, he might be immortal. There’s nothing he can’t come back from, at least nothing they know of, but just. Just no. Peter will never get over witnessing Wade bleeding out while the only thing he can do is _no_ thing. It’s not going to happen, no matter how many times Wade tells him “not to sweat it”.

     “Credit where credit’s due though, it wasn’t my idea,” Wade continues. “I was getting your favorite pizza, you know, from this place downtown? So yeah, I ran into Shocker and guess what? He was nice enough to pin this take out bag right here to my chest with his knife so I’d have both hands free to kick his ass. God, he’s so considerate sometimes, isn’t he? Anyway, here’s pizza!”

     It’s easy being fooled by Wade’s cheerful attitude and practically infallible ability to talk a mile a minute. Peter’s been there, which is why now, he knows better. Wade’s died in the middle of making a crude joke about Peter’s butt in Spandex on one occasion, died on Peter’s back while they’d swung around SoHo on another. Peter considers himself to be smart enough not to make the same mistakes twice, not if he can help it. So he doesn’t.  

     He folds the blanket back and slides off his bed. His next words come out a little shaky, a tiny bit breathless, it’s just that Wade won’t stop bleeding and fuck, why won’t he stop bleeding?

     “Wade, we talked about this, remember? I have trouble making small talk when there’s a hole the size of a Double Whopper in your body.”  

     Wade gives Peter a goofy smile, or more like, his mask does, which never fails to weird Peter out. “Gee, one hole you notice about me and then it’s not even my best one.”  

     Wade has the nerve to pout and cross his arms, which results in him jostling the knife and groaning in what’s undoubtedly pain. Peter didn’t know he had an ounce of strength left in his body, but he’d obviously been wrong about that, seeing as he’s at Wade’s side within a nanosecond flat. One string of web is shot beneath his bed to pull out the first-aid kit—which has become more of a first-aid _duffel_ now that Wade keeps dropping by—another to pin Wade’s hand to the wall behind him, just so he finally stops messing with the knife.  

     “Woah, baby boy, all it takes for you to tie me down with that web of yours is being a little roughed up? Damn, you’ve been holding out on me,” Wade drawls.  

     Peter would love to tackle him for that one, but the truth is, he _is_ roughed up, so out of the goodness of his heart, he lets that one pass. The noble gesture would bear way more effect if he would stop grinning. This is really not the time to be weak to Wade’s raunchy jokes. The problem is just that Wade is still grinning, which is technically something Peter shouldn’t even be able to see with him wearing his mask, but he does and it’s hilarious. It must be all the sleep he’s _not_ getting messing with his head.  

     “Stop it!” Peter cries. “Stop making me laugh, you’re bleeding all over my crappy lino floor and I gotta fix it, so _please_. Behave.”  

     He shakes his head, and the grin finally abates to a smile. There. That’s better. Back to work.  

     Of course, Wade continues whispering horrible pick-up lines and thinly veiled sexual harassment remarks under his breath, but Peter turns a deaf ear for both their sakes and focuses on the task at hand, which is not letting Wade die on his watch.

     “You still with me?” Peter asks while he’s wrapping Wade’s chest in thick bandages.  

     “Always,” Wade says and takes Peter’s hand, and okay, wow, that sounded kind of . . . real. As in, not meant as a joke or trying to be funny, but real. _Real_ real, and that makes Peter’s head go all funny in a way he wishes he could chalk up to the lack of sleep, too.  

     Wade’s breathing has gone from wheezing to panting. Peter wishes he’d take off his mask, just so he can breathe easier. Not because he’d like to see Wade, for the sole reason of seeing him. That would be ridiculous, not to say highly unprofessional. It’s just to make sure he’s getting enough air.  

     “Petey,” Wade sighs when Peter’s fingers flutter over the bandages to make sure the fit isn’t too tight. “Have I ever told you that you’re the best nurse in the whole world? In a totally non-pervy way. Okay, maybe a little pervy. Like, thirty percent. Eighty.”  

     Peter smiles absentmindedly while he wraps the knife in a paper towel and puts it away. “Yes, you have. It’s usually followed by how I’m committing a crime against humanity, which is apparently code for _you_ these days, by not wearing a nurse outfit to go with that.”  

     Wade laughs out loud, which immediately winds down to a groan. “Damn right you are. But seriously, I don’t know how to thank you. Oh wait, actually, I do. Gonna buy you a nurse outfit in return. With white fishnet stockings. And fully expect you to wear it every day, because you never know when I might be in need of your _invigorating_ services.”  

     Peter feels a traitorous blush rise in his cheeks, and God, why is he still doing that? He knows damn well that’s just Wade’s very blatant way of flirting, there’s nothing remotely serious there. It’s just that the flirting gets a little sweeter, a little . . . needier, on the days Peter comes to Wade’s rescue and lets him sleep off the latest live round of “Dumb Ways to Die” on his couch. And makes him coffee after. Can’t forget about the coffee.  

     Anyway, yeah, the entire flirting business is different when Wade’s hurt and Peter takes care of him, but that doesn’t make it real. That’s just Wade being Wade, and Peter has no idea why he has to remind himself of that. Months of regular meetups for patrol and (thankfully) not-so-regular takedowns of super baddies together—one would think Peter is immune to Wade’s constant sweet talk by now, but he really, really isn’t.  

     “Is this a thing now?” Peter asks, biting his lip. “You using my apartment as your own personal sick bay?”  

     It’s only fair to be in the know about what he’s getting into, and that’s got nothing to do with Wade’s being too sweet when he’s hurt and everything to do with stocking up on the supplies Wade goes through on the daily.  

     “I’m not using your apartment as my own personal sick bay,” Wade says earnestly. “I’m using you as my own personal nurse. It’s about you, Petey. There’s a _huge_ difference.”  

     Yep, there Peter goes again with the blushing. Jesus Christ. He’s just . . . tired. Yeah, that’s it. Too tired to deal with things like acting cool and being unaffected and not letting Wade get to him.  

     Wade’s looking up at his face when Peter’s done making mental excuses, and Peter just . . . looks back, momentarily speechless for a reason he _swears_ he’d known two seconds ago. He can’t even see Wade’s eyes with him wearing his mask, but he’s still looking as if there’s an actual chance he might develop X-ray vision if he only stares hard enough.  

     It’s probably a violation of privacy and therefore all kinds of wrong when Peter reaches out and weaves his fingers into the seam on the bottom of Wade’s mask. This is the part where Wade’s supposed to say something, like _no_ or _what the hell, Spidey_ , or push Peter’s hand away. They have seen each other before when the masks had come off during battles, but always on their own terms. Which means, never for the sake of looking at each other, but more like as a direct consequence of a fight, where tearing suits and breaking masks is a daily occurrence. Peter has never taken Wade’s mask off, at least not without his explicit consent, and Wade has always stuck to that boundary in return. Well, he _used_  to stick to it, before he’d randomly started showing up at Peter’s apartment for “special treatment”. And still, it doesn’t change the fact that this right here, where Peter tugs softly on the material covering Wade’s face, is uncharted territory. Territory Peter’s normal self would never tread into, but since it’s already been established that Peter is not his normal self tonight, he doesn’t stop. Wasn’t there somebody famous who said personalities might be subject to change when suffering from insomnia long enough? That’s Peter. Change of personality? It’s happening.

     “Can I?” he whispers, just shy of breathless. There’s a slight tremble in his fingers, and Wade must feel it, because he reaches up and brushes his knuckles over the back of Peter’s hand.  

     “It’s a mess under here, baby boy.”  

     Peter’s quite sure Wade doesn’t realize how much resignation he’s letting into his voice, but it’s right there, in plain sight.  

     “Please,” Peter says.  

     Wade sighs. Then he smiles and drops his hand away from Peter’s, away from where he could stop him if he wanted to. “There’s no universe in which I could ever say no when you gimme those eyes.”  

     Peter doesn’t care about the stupidly adoring smile thing his lips do and shuffles closer, his thigh pressing against Wade’s. There’s heat there, warm and comforting, and Peter smiles wider when he realizes that there’s a very good chance tonight won’t turn out to be one of those nights where he has to watch Wade bite the dust.  

     He’s bringing his other hand up to join the first, and then he’s rolling the mask up and up and _up_ , as careful as he can manage, because he knows about Wade’s scars and the last thing he wants is hurt him by jumping the gun. And jumping the gun is a very real risk here, now that Peter is a literal moment away from seeing Wade, from looking into his eyes without a mask to obscure them or a fight to steal his attention away.  

     Peter holds his breath when he gets to that last millimeter, and then Wade’s right there, _so close_ , eyes screwed shut and teeth worrying his bottom lip enough to leave marks.  

     Peter runs the pad of his finger down Wade’s cheek, a smile in his voice when he says, “Huh. I signed up for the full mutant package, but this model doesn’t seem to have any eyes?” he taps a fan of tanned lashes splayed out on Wade’s cheekbone. “I want my money back.”

     The silly joke does the trick. Up to this point, the tension in the air has been thick enough to cut with a knife, but now that Peter hasn’t missed a beat, Wade’s whole body is relaxing back against the wall he’s pressed up against. He’s also grinning, which looks downright _incredible_ on those full lips of his. Not even his scars can take away from that.  

     And then there are his eyes, which holy— _wow_.  

     Peter knows he’s staring. He also knows that he’ll hate himself for it later, but right now, he couldn’t care less about later.  

     Wade’s eyes are gorgeous. Outright stunning. Beautiful. The softest shade of hazel, and are those flecks of—  

     Wade makes a soft noise in his throat that sounds like a mix of distressed and turned on, which is almost enough to jolt Peter out of the not-so-subtle eyeballing he’s doing.  

     “Petey,” he breathes. “You’re close. Very, very close, and I’m neither prim nor proper enough not to take advantage of that, so maybe you wanna—yeah, that’s . . . Whew, okay.”  

     Peter backs away so fast that he all but crashes into the sofa, his face flushing red-hot, heart hammering against his ribcage.

     What is he doing? _Get a damn grip, Parker._  

     “S-sorry,” he mumbles, eyes fixing on his lap. His lap, which is covered by boxers. _Just_ boxers, and why exactly is he only noticing now that he’s spent the last hour around Wade in nothing but his underwear?  

     Wade’s apparently thinking along the same lines, and because this situation is far from being awkward enough, Wade calls him on it. “Care to explain your outfit?”  

     He’s snickering. He’s also staring. And damn if it doesn’t do something to Peter, something he’s not ready for, especially not when all he’s wearing is one flimsy piece of clothing.

     “I was just . . . I was sleeping when you did a B&E on my place, like any normal person does at two thirty in the morning,” he says, way too defensive for no reason at all. His gaze drops to Wade’s legs, his _bare_ legs. He wishes he could help himself. He really does. But Wade’s legs are right there, and they are all gorgeous muscles and thick thighs, bare and tucked into tight boxer briefs.

     He clears his throat and forces himself to stop staring. “What’s your excuse?”  

     Wade runs his palms over his boxers to smooth them out, and Peter’s trying really hard not to follow the motion with his eyes, and even harder not to crawl over there on all fours and take the smoothing out off Wade’s hands.  

     “I lost my pants,” Wade says, as if that’s a perfectly normal, everyday thing to happen. “And you’re staring. You just _love_ the boxers, don’t you?”  

     Right. The part where Peter is _not_ staring isn’t working out too great. About now, it’s a good thing that Peter can’t physically blush any more than he already has, because he’s helpless against sneaking a peek (okay, a pretty _long_ peek) at Wade’s underwear, which is blue and red and has little Spider-Man figures printed on it.  

 _Oh god._  

     He’s gonna faint. For real. Tonight’s the night Wade’s finally getting him to swoon. “I can’t believe you’re wearing, well, _me_. Down there.”  

     “Believe it. I like to keep you close to me at all times. Well, close to the parts that matter.”

     Wade wiggles his sparse eyebrows for good measure, and Peter hides his face in his hands. At this point, fainting doesn’t even seem like such a bad thing.  

     “Okay, let’s just _not_ , alright?”

     “But—”  

     “Can you stand?” Peter interrupts before Wade can say something else that gets him just that much closer to a serious case of spontaneous self-combustion.  

     “Sure can. My third leg, that is. Wanna see?”  

     “Wade!” Peter squawks. “Stop it! God. I’m nowhere near lucid enough to do this right now.”  

     “My baby boy’s touchy today, huh?” Wade says. “I can stand. I think. Do you mind?”  

     Peter’s brain is still hung up on how Wade just called him my baby boy, not the baby boy, but the _my_ part of it, to get that Wade’s referring to his hand, which is still secured to the wall by a delicate amalgam of Peter’s webs.  

     “Oh! Uh, sorry. Sure.” He walks over and kneels next to Wade to tear through the webbing. “Do you need help getting up?”  

     “No,” Wade says and uses the wall for support. As soon as he’s upright and lets go, his knees give way and he’d have collapsed like a card house if it weren’t for Peter, who’s catching him mid-air.  

     “Okay. Yes. I’ll take the help. This time,” Wade concedes.  

     Peter can’t suppress a smug smirk. He wraps Wade’s arm around his shoulders and tucks his hand into his side to lead him to the bathroom.  

     “Please don’t tell me you need help washing up. My non-certified nursing skills only go so far,” Peter says, half-hoping Wade says yes, actually, he _does_ need help. He’s seen Wade’s face, his eyes (damn, _those eyes_ _)_ , and instead of being grateful for small favors like a good boy, he’s only curious for more. Who wouldn’t want to see the chest that goes with thighs like that?

     “Nah, I’m fine,” Wade replies. “Unless you want to help, in which case my answer is yes, please, _nurse Petey_. Strip me down. Clean me up. If there is anyone who can scrub off my kinda dirty, it’s you.”  

     “O-kay,” Peter groans. “Offer retracted.” _Ha. No, it’s not._

     Peter has a sneaking suspicion that there’s more to what Wade said about “scrubbing off his kinda dirty”, much more, but he bites his tongue and doesn’t dig deeper.    

     “Damn. You can at least stay and watch the show then.” Wade’s already working on slipping off what remains of his suit, which Peter figures is the show he’s referring to, so Peter turns and leaves, closing the bathroom door behind him.  

_What a night._

     He doesn’t like how much everything that’s happened since Wade’s crawled through the window is making him feel. He doesn’tlike how, despite of it, he doesn’t want it to _stop_ making him feel how he feels. He’s just not himself tonight, and what scares him the most is how good that feels. Goddammit. What he _should_ do is slip back under the covers and spend the rest of the night convincing himself none of this ever happened. But what he _does_ do is tiptoe to the bathroom to press his ear up against the door and listen to the shower going inside, wishing he was in there instead of out here.   


	2. Chapter 2

     Wade takes his sweet time. He still hasn’t left the bathroom by the time Peter has scarfed down a slice of toast and a glass of water to go with it. The adrenaline is bleeding out of Peter’s system now, slowly but surely, which makes room for the exhaustion he’s managed so well to rein in. Up until now, that is. His eyes keep fluttering shut and his movements are a far cry from their usual grace as he makes his way into the living room. He gets down on his knees to clean up the mess of blood on the floor, careful not to get any on himself, and pack away the remaining med supplies. When that’s done, he walks over to the messy bed and takes a seat. He’s only meant to _sit_ on the bed and wait until Wade’s done and they can exchange a round of the most awkward goodbyes in the history of goodbyes, but all of a sudden, he’s lying back and blinking up at the ceiling and the saggy mattress is soft and warm and he’s so, so incredibly tired—  

     “Petey? Hey, baby boy, you asleep?”   

     There are fingers in Peter’s hair, combing through the strands and brushing the tops of his ears. He wants to purr with how good it feels. This week has been less than stellar so far, and this is the first genuinely good thing he’s getting out of it. It’s only on the really bad days that Peter lets himself remember how much he misses it—being held, being touched. Someone to come home to, someone to fall asleep with. Someone who chases the nightmares away.  

     “Mhng,” he murmurs.  

     There’s a soft laugh from somewhere close to him. It’s such a nice sound. Peter doesn’t dare say something coherent, in case that is what makes whatever bubble he’s currently in burst and disintegrate, and he really doesn’t want that. What he also really doesn’t want are those soft, soft touches to stop.  

     Then Peter feels warm breath against his neck, along with what could be a nose gently bumping his lobe.   

     “I’m taking off, let you sleep. Thanks for everything.” A pause. “I mean it.”   

     Peter’s too far gone to know—or care, for that matter—what he’s doing. What he does know is that Wade isn’t supposed to take off. He can’t say how he knows, and yeah okay, granted—there’s a slight chance that what is generally _supposed_ to is more like what Peter personally _wants_ , but right now, Peter’s too selfish to make a distinction between the two.   

     Wade has already turned away from the bed and is heading for the window when he’s stopped by another string of webbing around his wrist. Peter thinks he hears him suck in a sharp breath of air before he turns around.   

     “Pete?” he whispers. There’s hope in there, and no, that’s not a figment of Peter’s (pitifully wishful) imagination this time.   

     Peter swallows. Is he really going to do this? Asking Wade to stay would mean something. It’s crossing a line, Peter’s well aware of that, so maybe he should give this more thought, dissect all the possible implications, all the consequences, of which there are undoubtedly _many_ , before—  

     “Stay.”   

     So much for thinking things through. Did he even try? He could say yes, of course he did. He’d not be Peter Parker if he didn’t think about his actions, right? Wrong, because in the case at hand, that would only amount to kidding himself.

     Wade stares at him. Just stares, without saying a word. Peter’s not even sure he’s breathing. There’s a shiver whispering through Peter’s body in response to Wade’s eyes on him. They just . . . _do_ something to him. The tension is electrical, so much that it’s hard to breathe, and Peter knows why. It’s because he’s done it, he’s crossed that line and now things are turning into this awkward mess where neither of them knows what to say or do and the whole situation ends in Wade leaving with a forced joke and an even more forced smile, only to dissolve whatever weird relationship they have and never _ever_ —  

     “Petey?”  

     Peter jolts out of the horrible scenario his mind’s cooking up for tonight’s aftermath with a shake of his head. “Sorry, I . . . spaced out again, didn’t I?”   

     “You did,” Wade says fondly. And then he’s finally, _finally_ , coming back to bed. Okay, that . . . sounds wrong, but whatever, Wade’s back to sit down on Peter’s bed and reaches out to run his fingers through Peter’s hair. This time around, Peter does purr, and if Wade’s megawatt smile is anything to go by, he likes that. A lot.   

     “You want me to stay?” Wade asks, shaking his head incredulously. “Why?”   

     Peter leans into Wade’s touch, letting his eyes blink up at Wade from beneath his lashes. It’s corny and maybe more than a little unfair, but now that Peter knows what it does to Wade, he plans on taking full advantage.   

     “Because . . . you almost died. You almost died and I . . . I don’t want to be alone.” He takes a deep breath. “You can take the bed, if you want? You’re a lot bigger than I am, and you’re still healing, so . . .” he trails off with a weak smile and a one-shoulder shrug.   

     Wade’s eyes are brimming with _something_. They look so soft and glossy and affectionate, so warm, and Peter just wants to spend whatever’s left of the night staring, wants to see what they look like when Wade’s about to fall asleep, when he’s doing his cackle-laugh, when he’s turned on. Would they flutter closed if Peter kissed him right now? Or would he fight to keep them open just to see what one single kiss would do to Peter?  

     Peter barely stifles a full-blown sigh when Wade’s fingers drop from his hair to his chin, and then Wade’s thumb is brushing over Peter’s bottom lip and Peter can’t remember what breathing is, let alone figure out the workings of it.   

     “You really sure?” Wade asks. “Fair warning, I jack off in the morning. Twice in a row. Loudly.”   

     “Great. Me, too.”   

     Wade grins. If Peter didn’t know better, he’d mistake the expression on Wade’s face for something like relief. And god, it suits him so well, Peter can’t help but grin right back.   

     “God, Petey,” Wade drops his head on Peter’s shoulder, chapped lips rough against the tender skin of his neck. “You’re killing me.”   

     “Figuratively, maybe. Literally, quite the opposite.”   

     Peter runs his palm over the bandages around Wade’s chest before he gently nudges his shoulder.  

     “True,” Wade relents after a heartbeat of silence. Then he strips off his shirt, leaving him only in his stupid Spider-Man themed, tight boxer briefs that leave absolutely _nothing_ to the imagination. “Now, move over. I’m coming in.”   

     Peter’s still busy sputtering something along the lines of _wait a sec, I’m taking the couch_ when Wade slides beneath the covers. Peter may or may not gasp when he feels Wade’s bare leg line up with his. If he does, he sure as hell isn’t going to admit it.  

     What he needs is a break so he can catch his breath and freak out over how they went from patching up to sharing a bed. The thing is, he can’t. Definitely not right now, because right now, _Wade is in his bed_. There’s the full effect of his body heat, which is absolutely lovely and feels even better where it’s touching Peter’s bare skin. And there’s a lot of bare skin on skin, because Wade’s not only in Peter’s bed, but he’s in Peter’s bed naked. Okay, not like, _all the way_ naked, but what difference does one tiny little pair of boxers make? Correct, none, so Wade’s practically naked. In bed. With _him._  

     Peter guesses this is where he kisses the idea of getting any sleep tonight goodbye.  

     “You’re stiffer than my morning wood,” Wade snickers. “What’s wrong, did you pop a boner or something?”  

_Jesus Christ._

     Peter wants to laugh hysterically, because yeah, he _might_ have gotten a teeny, tiny bit hard over the fact that there’s a huge beefcake of a man in his bed, someone who’s—wow— _just_ his type, someone who’s Wade freaking Wilson.    

     “I can assure you, I did not pop a boner.” Okay, so that might be bit of a lie, but it’s necessary. Very necessary.     

     Wade rolls his eyes dramatically. “That’s exactly what I hoped you would _not_ say.”   

     Peter grabs one of the little throw pillows he keeps around his bed for a semblance of decor and smacks it in Wade’s face.   

     “Okay, I get it. I made it weird by asking you to stay. But you said yes and now we’re apparently doing this, so . . . it would be much appreciated if you didn’t try so damn hard to go one better on me.”  

     Wade stills. His expression does a total one-eighty compared to a second ago. Unsuspecting souls might actually think he’s serious for a change.   

     “I’m sorry,” he murmurs softly. “I’m glad you did. Ask me to stay, that is. It’s . . . unreal. The kind of unreal you usually slap on the life goals you’re never going to reach and the resolutions you’re never going to stick to.”  

     Peter snorts and tugs the blanket over his bare shoulder. He’s getting cold, too cold for comfort, and doesn’t that make it okay to snuggle up to Wade’s chest and mooch off a little bit of his delicious body heat? And if they’re at it, maybe Wade could tangle his legs with Peter’s and keep his toes warm along with the rest of him and—

 _Crap_.   

     The biggest mistake he can make here is thinking about cuddles. With how long he’s been going without any, thinking would only lead to craving, and he can’t allow himself to crave. Not with Wade in his bed. They are _this_ close to becoming friends, real friends, and Peter cares too much about that to blow this chance.   

     “We should try to get some sleep,” he says. Isn’t that just the best idea he’s had all night?   

     Wade is watching him intently. Peter fights down the shiver that’s tingling beneath his skin in response to these incredible hazel eyes Peter can feel on his skin like a physical touch. He has the feeling Wade wants to say something, but in the end, he just nods and closes his eyes. So Peter does, too.   

     For all of two minutes.   

     He’s only meant to sneak a peek. No, really. Just to see if Wade’s out already. It would be weird to look only to find Wade had beaten Peter to it. And then exactly that happens. _Awkward._  

     “Uh,” Peter says like the eloquent genius he is.  

     “I thought we were supposed to try getting some sleep?” Wade asks.   

     He shifts under the covers and his toes brush Peter’s calf. It’s embarrassing how Peter isn’t fast enough to swallow his moan. What’s even more embarrassing is how he has to bite his tongue in order not to ask Wade to do it again.   

     “We are,” Peter says. “It’s just . . . I don’t know. Having trouble sleeping lately. Don’t worry about it, you just go ahead. Pretty sure you’re exhausted after what happened tonight.”  

     Wade looks at him for a long, long while. There’s sympathy in his pretty eyes, along with the kind of understanding that comes with going through the same thing. It’s then that Peter’s one hundred percent sure that Wade _knows_. That he knows everything Peter is not saying, and Peter isn’t sure why it triggers such a beautiful ache inside his chest, but it’s been so long since he’s truly connected with someone. Someone who’s right there with him, who looks beneath the mask—both the metaphorical and the literal one—and understands what it means to be a superhero, who knows all about responsibilities and sacrifices and loneliness.  

     Wade doesn’t drop his gaze when he says, “I could . . . I mean, if it helps, I could . . . you know, hold you?”   

 _God, yes_. _Please hold me._

     It’s on the tip of Peter’s tongue, so intent on getting out that for a moment, he forgets why he’s not supposed to say it. But Wade’s right there, looking so soft and comforting and alive, and if Peter’s tired eyes are anything to go by, a teeny, tiny bit hopeful. And fuck, Peter wants it. He wants it so, so bad.   

     He bites his lip, then forces himself to meet Wade’s eyes when he says, “Maybe . . . just a bit?”   

     There’s a flicker of pure shock crossing Wade’s face, as if he’d never expected that this is what Peter’s going to say. Maybe he was only being half-serious about the suggestion, but now it’s out there, and Peter can tell he’s not the only one who wants to go through with it.   

     Time stops—and Peter’s heart right along with it—when Wade inches closer and opens his arms in a tentative invitation.  

     It should be weird. There ought to be some sort of reluctance, of internal _what the hell are you doing, Peter_ , but that’s the thing—there is none. No sliver of doubt, no shred of _no_. So maybe slipping into Wade’s arms and burying his cheek against his chest isn’t supposed to feel this right, but it does.  

     “Woah,” Wade breathes.   

     “Feel good?”   

     “God. Fuck. Yeah,” he says, hugging Peter closer and leaning in to nose through his hair. “Feels so good.”   

     Peter hums in approval. It’s quiet, but with how close they are, Wade hears anyway. It’s like a switch has been flipped inside Peter’s brain, because where he’s been uptight and on edge just a second ago, he’s all languid comfort now. Sleep doesn’t only feel attainable, but like something Peter wants, something he’s downright yearning for, and when has _that_ ever been the case before?  

     One thing the mission of reconciling being Peter Parker and Spider-Man takes is time. Heaps of it. Anyone who knows his secret knows eight hours of sleep is just not in the cards for him. What they don’t know is that Peter wants it that way. Spider-Man is infamous for being a smart-ass all around, so much that lots of people have told him he makes fighting crime seem almost effortless. Almost easy.   

     It’s anything but.   

     And it’s the nights that get to him—that always get to him—when the nightmares creep in to replay all the fights he’s lost, all the people he couldn’t save. It’s when he wakes up screaming himself hoarse and no one is there to get him through it that he realizes how alone he is.  

     And that’s his story, that’s why he’d much rather drive himself well past his breaking point than come home to an empty apartment that makes _him_ feel empty.   

     How long has it been that he’s had someone share his bed? It’s almost cruel, how good it feels. That all it takes, apparently, is Wade’s arms around him and his breath in his hair, toes brushing his as if by chance. Peter swallows past the lump in his throat. There are a million thoughts wreaking havoc on his brain, but he forces them all down in favor of doing exactly what he wants to do. It works surprisingly well. He bites his lip, partly to keep from making all the sounds he’s yearning to make, partly to keep himself grounded, and then he wraps his arm around Wade’s hip and lets his palm travel over his side, to the small of his back—so soft that the touch is barely more than a puff of air against his broken skin.  

     “Is this okay?” Peter whispers.   

     “I wonder how it’s okay for _you._ I mean . . . You’re touching me,” Wade breathes. “As if you actually want to.”  

     Peter chuckles as he runs the pads of his finger along Wade’s spine. The scar tissue is a little more rugged here, and Peter wonders how much he can touch Wade, how _hard_ he can touch, without hurting him.   

     “Nobody is forcing me, you know. Which means that yes, I do actually want to.” _I want to do so much more._   

     Suddenly, Peter’s on his back with Wade between his legs, and wow, fuck, he really shouldn’t like this as much as he does, but there he is. There’s a whole new range of sensations now, from the way their bodies rub against each other to the feel of Wade’s body weight on top of him, pressing him into the mattress. Usually, Peter doesn’t like being held down, has always hated the helplessness and submission of it, but when it’s Wade, he only feels safe.   

     Wade’s eyes are blazing, somehow even more in the dim light, his hands on the mattress to either side of Peter’s head, caging him in between.   

     “Why?” Wade asks. It comes out on a whisper, but that’s fine, Peter gets it, because he himself can’t produce anything more solid than that when he replies, “What do you mean?”   

     “Why do you want to touch me? I mean, aren’t you disgusted? Freaked out? I’m far from pretty boy material, not like—like—”  

 _Like you_.   

     It’s right there, hanging in the air between them, with much more weight than anything unspoken has the right to possess. Peter’s used to the self-deprecating remarks and spiteful jokes, but this is the first time Wade lets himself be vulnerable, lets Peter see past the usual bravado of ugly and proud, and Peter’s heart aches for Wade, for the pain that’s so obvious now that he’s not trying to hide it, for every time he says he’s not good enough and actually means it.  

     It might be the unwavering compassion that’s always been ingrained in Peter’s very bones, but he wants to take it all away—the insecurity and self-hate on Wade’s face, the belief that he’s too broken to be close to anyone in his eyes. And because actions speak louder than words, he shows him.  

     He reaches up to cup Wade’s face, smiling when he leans into the touch despite how obviously he’s trying not to, runs his thumbs over those pretty, pretty lips and down the curve of his neck and the muscles straining under his skin as if they can’t get close enough.   

     “Look at me, Wade,” he urges softly. “Do I look disgusted to you?”   

     Wade’s eyes blink open, very slowly, and then he’s gazing down at Peter, takes in the soft longing in his eyes and the warm smile on his lips.   

     “You don’t. For some weird, totally inexplicable reason, you don’t,” he says, as if he can’t believe he’s saying what he’s saying, and Peter’s glad that the side of him that’s all self-hate and zero self-esteem allows him see what Peter wants him to see.  

     But Peter doesn’t only want to show him. He wants him to be right there with him, to see it for himself, _feel_ it for himself.   

     “Do I look like I don’t want _this_ —” fingertips flutter over Wade’s pecs, delicately brushing his nipple, “or this?” palms wander down Wade’s sides, mapping out the slant of his ribs.   

     Instead of a reply there’s a groan from Wade, long and low, eyes fluttering shut. He looks overwhelmed in the best way possible, and Peter’s trembling because he knows he’s the one who’s doing this to him. Wade’s melting against Peter’s body, all soft and pliant. His forehead touches Peter’s, and a moment later, they’re breathing the same air. It’s that moment, where Peter feels Wade’s breath against his lips, that makes him want more. So much more.  

     He blinks up at Wade, waits until he opens his eyes again, then takes a deep breath and closes his own. It’s a wordless, unmistakable invitation, and Wade gasps when he recognizes it for what it is, barely audible, but he does.  

     “Petey, I don’t—”   

     “Shh,” Peter whispers. “Shut up and kiss me.”   

     There’s a moment of silence in which Peter’s heart is pounding so hard that he’s sure Wade can feel it with how close they’re pressed together. He can’t tell where the sudden urge is coming from, this _need, need, need_ thrumming through his body and singing in his veins, but he wants this, wants it so much that his breath hitches in his throat when he thinks about what it would feel like to have Wade’s lips on his, his tongue in his mouth, on his skin . . .   

 _Please, Wade. Come on_.   

     Wade shifts on top of Peter, inching closer and closer and _closer_. Their lips touch just so when Wade says, “I can’t believe I’m kissing you.”   

     “Right now, you aren’t,” Peter says with a fake pout and a raised eyebrow, wrapping his arms around Wade’s neck to gently bring him back to where he wants him. “Right now, you’re talking.”   

     Wade’s smiling when he kisses Peter then, and Peter can’t help but smile back. Well, at least until Wade’s tongue licks the corner of his mouth and the noises start coming, the drawn-out moans and little gasps Wade’s just too eager to swallow.  

     Goddammit, he’s good at this. Not that Peter had doubts there, it’s just . . . it’s just that this is really, _really_ good. Peter is no virgin in the kissing department by any means, but he didn’t know kissing could be like this, where his toes curl and sparks go off behind his eyelids, where he’s seriously questioning if breathing is all that important when he can have _this_ instead. It’s safe to say that Peter has never been kissed like this, like Wade is a dying man and Peter’s the cure that keeps him alive.    

     It should have been enough. This is new to both of them after all, and Peter doesn’t think he’s the only one who’s pretty much clueless about what it is that’s happening between them right now, but—  

     —But damn, it’s not. It’s not enough.  

     Peter wants to be wrapped around Wade, wants to be held down, wants his hands on his waist, his teeth in his skin. He wants—god, the things he wants. Peter strives to be in control, strives to keep his cool in any given situation. He’s gotten so good at it, too, but leave it to Wade to blow all that to smithereens, because control? There’s no such thing as control when Wade is kissing him, when he’s whispering _baby boy_ against his lips, soft like a caress and insistent like a promise.  

     How does it feel to relinquish control for once? To not be the one everything comes down to?  

     Peter wouldn’t know, but Wade is teaching him, with his eyes and his lips, with his fingers that must be imbued with some kind of magic, because the more Wade touches him, the more Peter wants to give him. It’s unfair, how easy Wade is disarming him—the guarded poise he’s acquired through years of being something between a boy and a superhero, the instincts that are honed to perfection. The worst thing might just be that it’s exactly what Peter wants, to be disarmed by someone he trusts, someone who takes care of him without asking for anything in return. Someone who tells him it’s okay to let himself fall, because he’s there to catch him. Someone who’s Wade.   

     When Peter’s legs wrap around Wade’s waist he can’t help but notice what a perfect fit it is, and apparently Wade agrees, because he moans against Peter’s lips like no tomorrow. Then he gasps when Peter tightens up enough to make them rub against each other in a way that’s all delicious, all insistent. All dangerous.   

     “Peter, wait—”   

     “Pe—”  

     “Hey!”   

     Okay, so somewhere in his periphery, Peter notices Wade’s trying to get his attention, obviously to say something. But talking would require them to stop kissing, and even when Peter should start acting like an adult right about now, he just can’t find it in himself. It’s all Wade’s fault. Wade and his stupid kissing Peter can’t get enough of.

     After two or three more kisses, he lets Wade manhandle him in order to get their lips off each other, which . . . let’s just say is not his _best_ idea, because Wade and manhandling and Wade manhandling _him_ does absolutely nothing to quench his thirst.    

     Wade’s eyes are glossy, his breathing heavy and voice all but wrecked when he says, “You don’t want to take this further, baby boy. Shit, I really fucking want you right now, so please,” he takes a deep breath and stares into Peter’s eyes, the urgency so very prominent in those pretty hazels, “don’t take me to where I can’t stop myself.”  

     Peter is touched by Wade’s desperate request, by the fear in his face that betrays how worried he is about Peter, about their friendship, about doing something they can’t undo and every single little thing it’s going to change.  

     “But what if I don’t want you to stop?” Peter says. “What if I really fucking want you, too?”   

     Wade attempts a cocky smile, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “Then I’d like to revisit the possibility of you suffering from a very serious concussion due to that giant of a thug backhanding you last night. Don’t you just love me now for knocking him out for that one? And how much, on a scale of one to eleven?”

     “Wade!” Peter whines. “Be serious." He adds a quiet “please”, too.

     Wade leans down to kiss Peter’s forehead, and Peter thinks he’s doing it to hide the sad smile on his lips, but Peter sees it. And feels it. Like a flesh wound.

     “Then . . .” Wade says slowly. “I’d tell you that you deserve so much better than me. _So_ much better. Since you obviously don’t know that.”   

 _Bullshit_.   

     Peter flips them over so that he’s on top of Wade, his eyes stinging with determination. He takes a hold of Wade’s hands and places them on his face, across his chest, down his body. He needs Wade to realize how serious he is, and how much he wants Wade to see that. Because Wade _is_ good, and no brand of crazy or amount of scarring makes a difference. Peter blushes when he does it, but he won’t be deterred by anything—especially not something like nerves—so he doesn’t even hesitate when he reaches for Wade’s hands and puts them on the swell of his ass.   

     “I’ve seen you properly for the first time today, and instead of wanting to run the other way, I just _want_. You hear me? I want _you,_ Wade. I just have to figure out a way to make you believe me.”   

     Yeah, it’s not exactly fair game, but Peter rolls his hips against Wade and moans softly when he meets undeniable hardness between his legs.  

     Wade’s falling, Peter can feel it. He just doesn’t know it yet.   

     “Peter, you . . . you don’t know what you’re saying. You’ve been pushing yourself too hard lately. You’re confused and tired and on edge and you—”  

     “—have never been more sure than I am right now,” Peter says as he lies down on top of Wade, covering him like a blanket, and of course—as if it was ever up for debate—his cock lines up with Wade’s as if they were made to fit together, just like this.   

     And now Peter’s the one who’s falling.   


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so much for your love and support, the response I’ve gotten for this fic so far is unexpected and seriously amazing, THANK YOU!!! Here, have an extra long update. <3

     It happens so fast. Within the blink of an eye really, that Peter finds himself pinned under Wade, under all that freaking sublime body weight, Wade’s hands all but wrenching off his underwear. Peter is barely hanging on at this point, so he’s glad for Wade taking control. Or maybe glad is not the right word for how he feels about Wade taking control. Maybe turned on beyond recovery is more like it.   

     “Wade,” he moans, one hundred percent not caring about how needy he sounds, and damn, he really _does_ sound needy. He runs his nails down Wade’s muscular back while he’s busy mouthing at Peter’s neck, sucking angry bruises along his jugular, and bunches the fabric of Wade’s boxers in his hands.   

     Gosh, he wants them gone, like, yesterday.   

     “You want me naked, baby boy?” Wade whispers into his ear, his tongue dragging across his lobe and eliciting a heartfelt moan that would’ve been beyond embarrassing in different circumstances.   

     “God, yes,” Peter pants. He’s _panting,_ as if he’s so turned on he can barely put two and two together, and wait, isn’t that exactly what he is?  

     Wade’s trying to get his own underwear off, his very tight underwear, which doesn’t exactly make it an easy feat. He’s wiggling on top of Peter, and Peter’s laughing as if he’s drunk, as if he’s high. He might just be. High on Wade, that sounds about right. This night, this moment, _Wade_ —he just really wants this so much that he’s struggling with the fact that this is, in fact, real. Real and happening to him. That it looks like he’s blessed by getting what he wants for once, without sacrificing anything for it.   

     Peter shuffles closer to Wade and grabs his arm, partly because he’s dying to feel him, partly because he’s running serious risk of straight out floating off this planet. The fact that Wade’s still struggling with his cute undies has Peter laughing again, and he’s still laughing when he playfully pushes Wade off the bed just for the fun of it. Too bad he manages to stand without tumbling over. Wade’s laughing too, his thumbs hooked into his boxers, hips swaying in a way that’s way too seductive for his own good. He’s all muscles, all hard edges and bulging power. Just looking at him feels like a reward.  

     “Wait,” Peter says, making grabby hands at Wade. “I want to.”   

     “You want to what, baby boy?”   

     The flirty smirk on Wade’s lips is almost enough to bring Peter to his knees, and not even the metaphorical ones. He reaches for Wade, but the little brat twists just outside of Peter’s reach.  

     “You know,” Peter says, fixing hungry eyes on Wade. Or maybe it’s the bulge straining against those Spider-Man boxer briefs he can’t stop staring at. For some reason, he’s really loving the boxers now. “I can see how hard you are in those boxers. Why don’t you stop sashaying around and come here so I can check out that impressive bulge?”  

     “Well, you damn well know my bulge takes the cake in the treat department, so if you wanna take a look? I’m thinking you gotta earn it.”   

     There’s a challenge in Wade’s voice, a come get me in his eyes. And Peter wants to, wants to get him more than he wants his next breath.   

     Slowly, he moves to the edge of the bed, never taking his eyes off Wade, who’s moving further and further away. Peter guesses he’s serious about the part where he has to earn it. Which is perfect, because he’s planning on collecting Wade just like the prize he is.   

     “You know you can’t exactly run from me, don’t you?” he says softly. His Spidey sense is all amped up and zeroed in on Wade, who’s smiling this trademark cocky smile of his that makes Peter want to wrap him up in webs and pull him back to where he can kiss it right off his lips.   

     “I’ve always been one for attempting the impossible,” Wade says, wiggling his eyebrows.   

     He turns around and runs. It’s not nearly as fast as usual with him still healing and Peter’s apartment being as small as it is, but the rush of adrenaline at the chase is the same. Instead of bolting after Wade, Peter takes to the ceiling. He can hear Wade giggling close by, and damn if he doesn’t have to stifle a chuckle of his own at what must be the most adorable sound in the world. Peter closes his eyes and focuses on Wade’s body just around the corner, the beating of his heart, the breathing that comes on little puffs and tiny giggles. The palpable arousal that’s pinging off Peter’s own and amplifying it tenfold in the process. The chase is exciting, but this is Wade he’s chasing and that means there’s a limit to Peter’s willingness to play games. When he rounds the corner, Wade tries to take off once more, but Peter shoots a string of webbing around his ankles, effectively breaking his stride. He drops to the floor just in time to catch Wade in his arms. Princess-style, too, because Peter knows how much Wade’s into that.   

     Wade squeals and wraps his arms around Peter’s neck. Then he presses a soft kiss to Peter’s cheek that, compared to the way they’ve kissed before, shouldn’t leave him reeling like it does.   

     “I love when you carry me around,” Wade sighs.   

     It triggers all the memories of Peter carrying Wade, sometimes for fun, usually when he’s too beat up to stand on his own. He’s not too beat up right now, though. No, right now, he just wants to be carried, what with the way he’s burying his face in Peter’s neck and making no move to get down.   

     Peter snorts. “Spoiled much?”   

     “Hey, I can’t help it! Not when you’re doing all these nice things for me, like patch me up and carry me around and kiss me. God, you _kissed_ me, Petey. What did you expect? Me getting all spoiled is on you.”   

     Peter tries to purse his lips in a display of mock indignation, but that plan is hopelessly thwarted by the smile that just refuses to stay under wraps.   

     “And knowing all that—how odd is it that I want to do it again, right?”  

     Wade’s eyes all but pop out of his head. Peter notes that they are still beautiful, even in their bugged out state. And there Peter goes again, being all distracted by that lovely hazel, so much that he’d have almost missed the fact that Wade is quiet.  

     He is quiet. Wade.  

     Something is obviously very, very wrong here, because ten times out of ten, Wade’s got something to say. He just doesn’t do silent.  

     It’s a good thing that Peter’s reached the bed by this point, because he can lie Wade down and crawl on top of him to take a good look and find out what’s gotten into him.  

     Wade has gone from shocked gawking to quiet watching, as if he’s trying his damned hardest to find something in Peter’s face without really knowing what to look for.   

     “So the idea of me kissing you is what it takes to make you shut up? I don’t know if I’m flattered or hurt.”   

     “No, Petey, I . . .” Wade crunches his eyebrows in a way that’s way too adorable to be on a universally feared mercenary’s face. “I guess I’m just trying to figure out the joke in there. Because believing that you want to kiss me, _again_ _?_  Just nope.”   

     Just listening to Wade talking about kissing makes Peter want to do it all over again.

     He presses a gentle kiss to Wade’s lips, just a tiny little thing, before he looks into his eyes and whispers, “Believe it.”   

     If Peter’s not mistaken—and he could be considering Wade just put his hands on Peter’s ass and the fit is A Plus—that’s an honest-to-god growl coming from Wade’s throat in response. God, that fucking growl.  

     Peter never knew anything along the lines of primal could be such a major turn on for him, but it is. It really, really is. Or maybe that’s just Wade, because Peter’s starting to think anything he does is a turn on. He wishes he knew what has happened between rolling his eyes over Wade treating Peter like his personal nurse and being utterly gone on Wade wearing Spider-Man boxers, just so he can put a finger on the big-ass _why_.  

     Why Wade’s so sexy that Peter wants and wants and wants.   

     Why Wade’s lips feel better than the air he breathes.   

     Why it took Peter so long to see how good Wade is, how right.   

     It’s funny, really, because if someone had told Peter that this is what Wade’s regular drivebys would lead to, he’d have laughed straight in their face. Or straight-out decked them. Whereas now, all he does is wonder how he could’ve been so blind. But okay, blind in all things romance, that’s him—what matters is that he’s not blind any longer. He’s all in, eyes wide open, and he wants this. He wants Wade. Every little piece of him.

     His lips are still pressed to Wade’s, tongue licking into his mouth as he spreads Wade’s legs with both of his. There’s a firework of color and taste and feeling going off in his body when their cocks line up in a way that takes Peter’s breath away, along with all his inhibitions. The ones that are left at this point, anyway, and there aren’t many of them.        

     He’s kissing his way down Wade’s throat, fingernails scratching along the bulge of his bicep and the inside of his wrist. His skin is rough and broken, but to Peter, it’s so touchable, so irresistible _,_ so much that he can barely go two seconds without touching any part of it.   

     “I caught you,” he whispers into the curve of Wade’s neck. “Which, in my book, means you’re mine now.”   

     Wade groans, his hands settling on Peter’s waist, thumbs rubbing soft circles into his hip bones. “Yours. That sounds damn good to me.”   

     Peter chuckles as he runs his nose along Wade’s shoulder. He wants to say something else, but there’s nothing that comes to mind, so maybe this is where he walks the talk.   

     The pads of his fingers dance across Wade’s skin, lower and lower and lower, until they meet the waistband of his ridiculously cute boxers and tug them down slow enough to give Wade a chance to back out. And backing out is apparently exactly what he plans to do, because his hand wraps around Peter’s wrist, preventing him from taking this any further. If it wouldn’t have killed the mood, Peter would have groaned in frustration. Getting acquainted with the concept of edging while there’s a man like Wade under him freaking sucks.   

     “Let me?” Peter whispers, meeting Wade’s gaze head on. He’s not going to back down. Wade deserves to see how desirable he is, how loveable, and no amount of Wade’s self-doubts or Peter’s understanding of them is going to mess with that plan.   

     “Pete, you . . . I can’t. I can’t let you,” Wade says. His voice couldn’t sound more torn if he tried. “Whenever I sleep with someone, they regret it. Usually, before the night is through. And I’m used to that, it’s okay. It’s fine. I deal. But you? You’re different, Petey. Waking up to you looking at me like I’m the worst mistake you’ve ever made, there’s no way I can deal with that. Do I want you? Fuck, yes. _Yes_. Y’know, I used to think what I really wanted was revenge on the guy who turned me into this mess, but then I meet you being everything that’s right and good in the world and suddenly revenge doesn’t matter anymore, because _you_ matter. Because you are the only thing making my miserable life a little less miserable, and I . . . I need that, Petey. I need you to be here. With me.”   

     And Peter—  

     —kisses him. Again and again and again, before he reminds himself Wade’s just given up a piece of himself Peter’s never seen before, never even knew existed, without the jokes and the sex and the self-deprecation, and that he’s supposed to say something to let him know how much this means.   

     “Wade.” One more kiss. “I’ll never regret taking this step. ” Another one. “Not when it’s with you.”   

     Wade’s looking at him, so intense and wide-eyed and hopeful that Peter has to fight off the urge to kiss him again. “And I will be here with you. I will—No, hey, look at me.”   

     He turns Wade’s face back from where he’s been trying to mash it into the pillow to conceal his expression. Or maybe it’s the wetness in his eyes he wants to hide. Peter kisses the corner of his eye before he pulls back and looks at Wade. It feels like the promise it’s meant to be when he says, “I will be here.”   

     Something inside Wade gives after that. Suddenly, he’s not being hesitant anymore, or insecure, or feeling as if he’s not enough. Suddenly, he’s impatient and fierce and avid for touch, for taste, for every inch of Peter he can get his hands, his lips, his skin on. Peter doesn’t know when or how it happens, but he ends up back under Wade, his hard body keeping him pinned to the mattress while his hands roam over Peter’s body and dig into his skin. Just when Wade takes off Peter’s underwear, his lips brush over a nipple and Peter cries out and bucks off the bed hard enough to take Wade with him.   

     “Mh, you like that, huh? Like when I do this?” He flicks the pink nub with the very tip of his tongue once, and what do you know, it’s all it takes to make it perk up all pink and tight.   

     “Jesus, Pete,” Wade groans helplessly. “I can’t believe how responsive you are . . . makes me want to tease you, see how far I can go. How far _you_ can go.”   

     When his lips close around Peter’s other nipple, Peter whines and thrashes, even while his hands cup the back of Wade’s head to keep his mouth as close to his chest as physically possible.   

     “Oh god, Wade,” he groans. Wade’s biting at his nipples now, and that feels so fucking good that Peter’s eyes keep fluttering shut, no matter how bad he wants to watch Wade, wants to see every stroke of that gorgeous tongue across his flushed skin. When Wade finally pulls off a few long moments later, Peter’s panting through parted lips, his cock so hard that it’s borderline painful, and fuck, he’s so wet. Wade’s tongue is an honest-to-god gift. It is.   

     Wade kisses his way down Peter’s body, his hazel eyes looking up at him in between every second and third kiss, to make sure they are still on the same page here. Peter spreads his legs to prove that from his end, they very much are.  

     “I didn’t think it was going to get much better than the Spidey suit on you. Turns out I was wrong. Shit, Petey, how gorgeous can you be?”  

     Wade runs a finger from Peter’s chest to his thigh, and Peter blushes all the way to the tips of his ears. Sure, Wade’s called him gorgeous (and hot stuff and candy cane and sex on Spandex legs), but never like this, where his eyes are adoring and reverent, where there’s nothing but honesty in his pretty voice. It’s different, and they both know it is.   

     “Wade?”   

     “Hm?” Wade hums against the inside of Peter’s thigh, where his lips are in the process of kissing a slow trail up to his loin. He’s getting dangerously close to where Peter wants him. This slow burn is driving Peter half-crazy with want, and he realizes that under all that want, he barely gets enough emotional space to be nervous. He _should_ be nervous, right? This is kind of really new to him after all. Anything sexual has always been just functional to him, without any real feelings involved, and Christ, surely nothing like the feelings he’s experiencing right now. The thing is, he’s not. No bout of nerves in sight, except for the nervous energy that’s screaming “take, take, take”. There’s nothing holding him back. And if there’s nothing, how wrong can this be?   

     He sighs a breathy sigh. Then, “Fuck me, Wade. I need you, _please_.”   

Wade’s eyes are doing their bugging out thing again. Maybe he didn’t think Peter was as serious as he is. Maybe he didn’t expect he would have the nerve to ask for it like he has.  

     “Please, Wade. Come on.”   

     Peter can see that Wade wants to say something, but he ends up swallowing it down. His eyes go back to soft heat, and he’s smiling as if Peter hung the moon.   

     Then he grabs Peter’s hand and places it on his arm. “Pinch me.”   

     “What?”   

     “Pinch me. This can’t be real. I mean, not that you kissing me or you letting me lick your nipples can be real, but you asking me to—to do that? With you? Yeah, no. As long as I haven’t died and gone to an alternate reality dubbed ‘Wade Wilson’s personal heaven’, that’s freaking impossible.”   

     Peter is smiling, too, when he lets his fingers wander down across Wade’s rock-hard abs, then lower until his palm is a mere inch away from his rock-hard dick. Wade gasps when Peter closes his fingers around his length and gives it a nice, hard squeeze. Emphasis on the hard part, because it’s a little too hard to be enjoyable, but hey, that’s exactly what he’s going for.   

     “What do you say, is one pinch gonna be enough?” he asks slyly, eyes burning with a mix of arousal and challenge. “Or do you need another?”   

     “God, Petey,” Wade all but wheezes, “At this rate, I might need you to pinch me six ways to Sunday.”     

     “You’ve come to the right guy, then. Rumor has it my muscle power borders on superhuman.”   

     Wade gapes at him, then spurts and starts laughing. Peter’s never seen him laugh before, not like this and not with the mask off, and it’s so mesmerizing that Peter can’t help but lean in and kiss him through it, Wade’s laughs a warm, affectionate echo in his mouth.   

     When he finally stops laughing a minute later, his arms are curled around Peter and his lips press tender kisses into his neck. Peter wasn’t aware that his neck is such a sweet spot for him, but trust Wade to make it one.  

     “Petey,” he whispers into his skin, “I adore you.”   

     “How much?”   

     “ _So_ much,” Wade replies.   

     “I don’t believe you,” Peter teases, shoving his shoulder playfully into Wade’s.   

     Wade pulls back with an expression shock on his face, a little too genuine to be play pretend. “How do I prove it to you?”   

     “Showing me would be a great start.”   

     Wade swallows. Peter does, too. And then he nods. “I’m going to take care of you, baby boy.”   

     Peter’s heart is beating up a storm inside his chest.   

     Finally.   

     For the better part of the night—maybe much, much longer than that—he’s wanted Wade, has wanted to feel him, to make him his. And now, Wade’s right there with him.   

     Thankfully, Wade doesn’t give him enough time to have a major freak out about that, because he’s getting up to kneel between Peter’s spread legs, and the view is so damn good that Peter can’t do much else besides stare. Okay, clearly, he’s been rash with that assumption, because then Wade’s curling his large hands around Peter’s hips and pulling his ass up on his thighs. But he doesn’t stop there. He keeps pulling and pulling until, oh, Jesus Christ, he’s eye level with Peter’s ass cheeks.   

     Peter’s about a millisecond away from blinking out of existence from sheer anticipation and desire, but Wade ups the ante. He gives Peter a cheeky smirk before he whispers “Bon appetit” and digs in.   

     The first puff of moist breath against his hole has Peter’s hands fly to his mouth in an attempt to stifle his scream.   

     The first stroke of that velvety tongue that comes right after, however, proves his hands alone are far from enough to make him stop screaming.   

     Geez, he prays the neighbors will cut him some slack, because at this rate? The entire complex is going to hear him scream himself hoarse before the night is through.   

     Wade obviously doesn’t give a damn. If anything, he’s doing his goddamned best to wring every last sound out of Peter, and boy, it should be illegal how good he is at it. And then there’s Peter, still struggling with the part where he realizes all of this is really happening, because Wade is eating him out, here, in Peter’s crappy IKEA full bed with the comic sheets that are older than dirt. It’s surreal.  

     And then there’s Wade groaning, “You taste fucking amazing,” against the sensitive skin at Peter’s entrance, fingers digging into his cheeks to keep them open, and that’s how Peter knows. Not only because it feels so much better than any dream could make it out to be, but because Wade’s voice right now—gruff, wrecked, _beautiful_ —sounds too damn perfect to be made of make-believe. Peter’s brain might be good, but no way it’s _that_ good. A moment later, Wade breaches Peter with the tip of his tongue, licking inside _,_ and all rational thought Peter may or may not have left at this point flies straight out the window.  

     Good god. How does this feel so good? How does _Wade_ make it feel so good, as if he knows all of Peter’s buttons and has absolutely no qualms about pushing them all at once?

     “Wade,” Peter moans, his hips canting up without his permission to get Wade deeper _._ “That’s . . . _fuck,_ that’s incredible.”

     A breathy sigh, a little whine, and then, “ _Wade.”_  

     Wade only hums against the soft, wet skin around Peter’s hole, revving the sensitivity up to off the fucking charts. Just when Peter thinks he’s going to come, Wade’s glorious tongue is gone and he’s gazing at Peter through his spread legs, lips wet and swollen. It’s so intimate, Wade looking at him while he’s all but spread out for him like a live buffet, Peter should feel the urge to look away, but he is not. Not when the sight he’s getting for it is the very definition of irresistible.  

     Speaking, however, that’s a different thing entirely.  

     “Mmmh, _ah,_ ungh . . .”  

     Wade smiles at him, and if Peter wasn’t sure about how to produce words earlier, it’s nothing in comparison to now. Wade’s smile slips into a smirk, and Peter barely has time to wonder why it looks so diabolic, before Wade’s pressing a long, thick finger into him, making Peter shout another string of unintelligible shit.  

     “What’s that, baby boy?” he grins. “You tryin’ to say something?”  

     Peter’s hands are fisting in the sheets, his entire body wanting to curl up tight. He’s so gone on Wade, so gone on his touch, his lips, everything he says and does.  

     Wade’s nuzzling Peter’s balls while he fingers him open, slow and deliberate. Peter wants to scream. His healing factor might be spectacular, but he’s sure the serious case of blue balls he’s heading for will turn out to be the one thing driving it to its knees.  

     “You’re so tight, Pete, god. I can’t wait to be inside you, feel your tight little ass squeeze all around me. You have no idea how long I’ve been dreaming about spreading you open to sink myself into all that perky glory.”  

     “Wade,” Peter moans in response. The mental image Wade is painting, Peter _wants_ it.  “Please. I . . . fuck me. _Please,_ I want you so much. Wanna feel you.” 

     “Oh, baby. If you keep begging me, I’ll blow before I get the chance to give you the sweet fucking you deserve,” Wade says just as he presses a third finger into Peter. Aside from a slight sting, there’s no pain. Wade’s sucked and fingered him open so good that all he feels at this point is the need to have Wade inside of him, thrusting in and out while those gorgeous hazel eyes are fixed on his.  

     Finally, Wade removes his fingers and . . . licks them. He sucks them clean, all the way from root to tip, as if it’s his favorite treat. Peter’s reduced to a staring, bumbling mess once again. Weird fact about Peter: he’s always been strangely fascinated by watching Wade eat, how he takes bites that are too big and chews loudly before he licks leftover sauce from his lush bottom lip. But this? This is a different level of savoring the meal.  

     “God, the way you _taste,_ Peter, I swear . . . you’re fucking killing me, it’s so good,” Wade breathes. With his wet fingers, he reaches down and grabs his cock, giving himself a few shallow tugs.  

     Peter fishes the lube and a condom from the drawer in his nightstand and smacks it against Wade’s chest. “Come on. You need this as much as I do, I can see it.”

     Yeah, he can see it, alright. A dead giveaway might be the fat head of Wade’s cock, which is turning a pretty shade of purple.  

     Wade uncaps the lube and squeezes a liberal amount on his fingers before he lathers Peter’s hole up enough to have drops drip down his crease and soak into the bedsheets.  

     “Turn around.”  

     “No,” Peter says. “I want it like this. I want to see you. Every second of it.”  

     Wade’s eyes close briefly. When he opens them again, they are soft and wet. He runs his fingers across Peter’s cheek, whispering, “Damn, Pete. Stop making me like you more than I already do.”  

     Peter smiles shyly and makes grabby hands at Wade. “Come here.”  

     Peter watches as Wade rips the condom open with his teeth and rolls it on. Then he leans down to cover Peter’s body with his own, like a blanket, soft and warm and secure. Peter’s breath hitches when he feels the blunt tip of Wade’s cock nudge his hole. He admonishes himself to keep his eyes open as Wade pushes inside, but they are fluttering shut on the first exquisite drag of Wade’s dick inside him. There are tears in his eyes when Wade slides deeper, he’s just _so fucking huge_ —

     “Peter,” Wade whispers against his lips, “You feel okay?”  

     “Better than. Keep going, please, you feel . . . you feel amazing, so good, _please_ . . . don’t stop.”  

     He wraps his arms around Wade’s neck and pushes his tongue between Wade’s lips, licking into his mouth and panting softly because it’s been too long that he’s gone without kissing him. Wade’s moving inside him, agonizingly slow and so tender that Peter’s ankles lock around his waist to get him closer, deeper, _more_.  

     “Harder,” he groans, blushing like crazy while he does. “I got a healing factor, you gotta work hard to leave your mark on me. And that’s what you want, don’t you? Mark me up, make me yours?”  

     Bingo, there it is, Wade’s growling. Fuck, he’s so hot, now even more that he sits back on his heels and pulls Peter’s ass on his lap, his hands gripping him hard enough to bruise. Peter’s nails alternate between digging into his thighs and scratching down his back when he leans in for a second to shove his gorgeous tongue down Peter’s throat for a sloppy kiss. It’s perfect. So perfect that when Wade changes his angle to nail that spot inside Peter that makes his toes curl into the sheets and stars dance across his vision and he feels his orgasm coiling inside of him like a living thing, he doesn’t want it to pull him under. He’s on the edge here, all but losing his mind with the need to come, and yet still, he’d much rather hold onto this, maybe forever. Because if he doesn’t, this is it. It’s over, and god, for some reason he really doesn’t want it to be over.  

     “God, Peter,” Wade pants into his neck, “You’re getting so tight, fuck—are you going to let go for me, baby? Come on, do it, let go. Lemme feel you come around me.”  

     Of course Wade’s doing the only thing Peter can’t refuse—he’s asking for it, with this wrecked voice of his that’s betraying how close he is, how he’s barely hanging on.  

     All Peter can do is whisper, _“Wade”_ and soak up Wade’s whisper of _“I’m here, baby boy”_ in return, and then his orgasm crashes into him, hard enough to kick him off course, and he hears himself scream as Wade fucks him through it, so slow, so fucking _soft,_ that Peter knows there’s no way this isn’t going to change him. It’s already happening.  

     Every last fiber of his body clenches around Wade, from his arms around his neck and his legs around his waist to his ass around his cock, and then it’s Wade who’s shuddering all over, who’s panting Peter’s name into his neck and digging his nails into his thighs as he comes into the condom.  

     And Peter almost comes again, because his name on Wade’s lips, it’s incredible. It’s a long time before the stars fade out of Peter’s vision and he feels like he maybe could make words if he wanted to, and that’s a very big if _._  

     Wade’s lying on top of him, nestled in between his spread legs, which are still wrapped loosely around his waist. He’s breathing against Peter’s skin as he comes down from the high. After a while, he turns his head and gives Peter a shit-eating grin.

     Peter runs his fingers over Wade’s head. “Isn’t an afterglow face supposed to look, I don’t know, blissed out or something? Yours looks kinda scary.”

     Wade giggles. “Shut up, Webs. It’s better than your O-face.”

     Peter raises both eyebrows. “No, it’s not.”

     “Duh,” Wade says with an eye-roll, “That’s because nothing in this world is better than your O-face, baby boy. It’s been a theory up until now, but after tonight I can confirm it’s the indubitable truth.”

     He says it as if it’s the most obvious thing ever. Peter blushes and gently flicks one of Wade’s earlobes. “Shut up. I can’t believe you’ve been picturing what my O-face looks like. That’s weird. And hot. Kinda.”

     Wade chuckles as he lays his cheek on Peter’s chest and runs his fingertips along his ab muscles. “It’s even better than the weird-hot combo, which is my favorite, by the way.” Wade sighs dreamily. “Fuck, now I really want your O-face again.”

     Peter’s spent dick twitches at the thought of Wade giving him yet another spectacular orgasm (and the O-face to match), but he’s too tired to do anything about it. Wade understands with a mere glance at Peter’s sprawled out limbs and afterglow-y face. He presses a gentle kiss to Peter’s lips and smiles when Peter purrs softly in response. He is already half asleep when Wade gets up and returns with a warm washcloth a moment later to clean them both up.

     “Mmmh, thank you.”

     Wade leans in and brushes a few locks of Peter’s hair away from his forehead before he kisses it. Then there are those moments after that feel like an eternity, but are most likely nothing more than a few seconds, in which Peter is alone in his bed. He holds his breath and clutches the bedsheet. If Wade wanted to leave, he wouldn’t stop him.

     Several frantic heartbeats later, Wade slips under the covers and wraps his arms around Peter, pulling him into his chest and tucking his nose and that gorgeous set of lips against the back of his neck.

     The relieved sigh is out before Peter can stop it. He’s not even sure he’d have wanted to.

     “Sweet dreams, Petey pie,” Wade whispers, lips brushing Peter’s hairline and eliciting another languorous shiver in the process.

     “Night, Wade,” Peter says around a yawn while he snuggles back against Wade. As an afterthought that’s too foolish to bring up but too insistent to ignore, he quietly adds, “Don’t leave, okay?”

     Wade just holds him a little tighter.

 


	4. Chapter 4

   It’s the first time in a long time that Peter really, truly sleeps. He sleeps without the looming anxiety, without the habitual nightmares, without the constant tossing and turning that amounts to getting up at the ass crack of dawn, when he admits to himself that sleep just doesn’t work out for him. Not that he’s complaining, not really anyway, because that’s the normal he’s resigned himself to a long time ago. He’s never been delusional enough to hope for change. Not until last night, because it turns out there’s an exception to the rule. A very big, incredibly mouthy and entirely too irresistible exception.

   Peter’s smiling while he slowly comes to. There’s the slight burn of exertion lingering in his muscles, a faint soreness in his hips and backside. It feels glorious, like a prize he gets to take home. And that’s even though Wade is the one who deserves a reward for making Peter feel it all the way until the morning after, healing factor and all. He’s really done it, he’s left his mark all over Peter’s body, exactly like Peter wanted him to. And just the thought of it has Peter’s arousal ratchet back up to eleven. Which could be a good thing, because now that he’s pondering how to repay Wade in kind, he thinks maybe a good old morning blow job is in order. Peter’s even willing to throw in some of that extravagant [Unicorn Frappuccino](https://www.popsugar.co.uk/food/Starbucks-Unicorn-Frappuccino-Recipe-45093414?utm_medium=redirect&utm_campaign=US:AT&utm_source=www.google.com) Wade’s currently obsessing over, the one that’s a real pain in the ass to make (who puts edible glitter into _coffee?)_ and that’s saying something. What might also be saying something is how Peter is apparently dead set on spoiling Wade rotten today. Huh. What can he say, his heart is still beating up a storm every time he replays last night in his mind—and he’s doing that _a lot_ —and he’s getting this ridiculously, _amazingly_ giddy feeling that makes him want to do stupid things, like squealing into his pillow right before climbing Wade like he’s Avengers Tower.   

   Okay, not helping. Not helping at all. It’s probably high time he took a page out of his unflappable Spider-Man persona’s book and _get a fucking grip._ There is a good chance Wade is not interested in waking up to Peter’s lips wrapped around his cock. Wait, what is he saying? Of course he is.

   Peter stretches his limbs, sighing softly when the movement makes him remember how well he’s been used a few short hours ago and how much he wants to do it all over again. He lets his hand wander across rumpled sheets and discarded clothing—wait, are those fluffy socks?—searching for Wade’s signature warm, rough skin and finding a whole lot of nothing.

   That’s when whatever Peter’s dreamed up about a perfect morning with tons of morning sex, glitter coffee and Wade bursts like a metaphorical soap bubble. His eyes fly open on a sharp gasp, and for a terrible second, he’s reminded of every nightmare he’s ever had and the subsequent jolting awake in bed, panting and disoriented. And alone. Just like he is right now.

   The cruel thing is, he doesn’t even have to get up to know he’s by himself. Maybe it’s his Spidey sense. Maybe it’s the strange sense of knowing he has developed by constantly losing people he cares about, because yeah, he might blow this entire thing way out of proportion, but this right here? Doesn’t feel much different. And while Wade might not be dead—god, let’s pray he isn’t—it doesn’t change the fact that Peter lost him. Because he has. He knows it like a mathematical certainty and feels it like a phantom pain.

   It’s just that knowing is one thing. Accepting? Quite another. And that’s why he can’t help being _that_ guy, the pathetic one who slips out of bed and heads for the bathroom, because even while he feels that he’s alone, he wishes, wishes so bad, that he isn’t. That this is a mistake where his Spidey sense is off for the first time in forever and Wade is just taking a quick shower down the hall before crawling back into bed with him. That would be so much better than the alternative, in which Wade walked out on him without saying goodbye, after what’s supposed to be a mind-blowing, earth-shattering and all around eye-opening night for both of them. And it was. For Peter, it sure was. He thought Wade had been right there with him, but the empty apartment tells a different story now, doesn’t it?

   Peter’s bare toes pad across the cool linoleum, and that’s when he realizes it’s not only his toes that are bare. He’s naked from head to toe—a tiny little fact that reminds him of why he’s naked and how it felt being naked with Wade, and god, now _that_ hurts. Peter’s familiar with pain, knows it like the back of his hand, but this kind of pain is new and bone-jarring.

   Peter reaches the bathroom door and feels a tiny little sliver of hope stir inside him when he finds it closed. It’s stupid, and when he opens up and looks inside, he’s slapped in the face by just how stupid it is, because the bathroom is empty. For some reason, seeing the towels on which Wade has done his version of folding on makes Peter choke up. It’s such an inconsequential thing, but the fact that Wade’s taken the time to clean up—or what he considers cleaning up, anyway—is a small reminder that last night really did happen. It wasn’t just a dream or something Peter made up to shut out the nightmares. Peter runs his fingers over the towels, which are still damp. He pictures Wade’s scent clinging to them, and gives himself a mental pat on the back when he successfully battles down the urge to press his nose into the warm terry cloth. Talk about pathetic.

   He moves over to the sink to splash cold water on his face. When he looks up, he sees it.

   A small note, ripped from Peter’s ‘be like a proton and stay positive!’ notepad and taped to the mirror by a pink Hello Kitty band-aid. 

 

> _Petey,_
> 
> _I can’t do this. I’m sorry._
> 
> _—W_

 

   Peter would have expected anything. Anything from a major freakout to selective amnesia to every possible kind of fucking on every possible surface in Peter’s apartment. He’d have expected ‘The Talk’ about what happened and where to go from here. And dammit, for a brief, impossibly sweet minute he’d thought of Wade and him as honest-to-god boyfriends.

   Yeah. Seems like pathetic is turning out to be Peter’s color of the week real fast.

   Peter drops to the cold tile floor and tucks his legs against his chest, his chin on his knees. Closes his eyes. Takes a deep breath. Then another one.

   He’s not going to lose it over this.

   He’s been through so much worse than being walked out on by a guy he’s really, seriously falling for, he’s _not_ going to lose it over this.

   Jesus fucking Christ, he is _so_ losing it over this.

   Aside from the pain that comes with opening up and being vulnerable for someone just to be dropped like a hot potato, he’s still trying to figure out the big ass _why_ here.

   So, Peter might not have a lot of experience in the relationship department. He might not be a pro when it comes to decoding someone else’s actions and reactions, but damn, he doesn’t need to be in order to _know_ that what he had with Wade was real. Every perfect, significant second of it. There was nothing casual about it, no play pretend. Peter meant it. _Wade_ meant it. And even when he’s not here to prove it, deep down, Peter feels like he knows.

   If only that would change anything.

   Even when he dares to believe that these fierce, all-consuming feelings he has for Wade are mutual, Wade still isn’t here. He’s not here, and why? Because he’s obviously decided to bail without so much as a goodbye kiss, but a lame, absolutely insufficient ‘I’m sorry’ note instead. Peter hands him his heart on a silver platter with a huge bow on top, and Wade takes it, takes all of it without leaving a single piece he hasn’t tasted, only to run before the sun is up.

   And this is where Peter gets angry. No, angry doesn’t even begin to cover it, because he’s furious. Wade didn’t even give him a chance. He left before Peter could wake up to Wade’s lips on his skin, his arms around his body and his dazzling scent in his nose, which is what he would have _deserved._

   He’s tried to make Wade believe, has tried _so hard,_ using every possible device he had at his disposal—from his lips and hands and voice, his body to this crazy, raging attraction between them.  

   It hadn’t been enough. Wade would be here if it had, and that fucking hurts, because he’s only realizing now that while Peter was busy promising Wade he’d always be here, Wade never planned on returning the favor.

  

* * *

 

    Three days. That’s all Peter’s giving himself to wallow in what could maybe be a broken heart—and that’s a huge-ass maybe, because he’d rather stab himself with the hunting knife Wade has left behind than admit he’s hurting over _that_ day. Yes, it’s dubbed _that_ day, effective immediately, because Peter has decided he’s no longer acknowledging the part where he has eagerly presented his ass only to find out first-hand what it feels like to get a boot in it.

   Nope. Not doing that anymore. Another great side effect of the whole thing is that no more sulking is included. Seriously, the minor freakout he had _that_ day, where he’s maybe kind of trashed the emergency duffel he’s kept at the ready for whenever Wade needed it, as well as annihilated the pizza (and not with his mouth) from Leo’s Wade had had pinned to his chest, was an honest mistake. It’s just that he wasn’t himself _that_ day, and considering his reasons for that circumstance, that’s a pretty good excuse in his book. Sure, there was also that little thing where he spent a full day in bed wrapped in nothing but Wade-scented sheets and ordered himself not to cry, over and over and over again. He’d failed at that, too, by the way. Or the thing where he’s left his window unlocked on the off chance Wade needed another impromptu treatment at Peter Parker General Hospital, or heaven forbid, came by to talk. _Or_ the thing where Peter’s trying not to fall back into old duffel-smashing-slash-pizza-annihilating habits whenever another night sans Wade goes by.

   The fact that this is the longest he’s gone without seeing a piece of the guy makes him fidgety and restless. It’s not full-blown anxiety yet, but he might as well be getting there. It’s not fucking fair, that. Peter’s done everything right, for god’s sake. But if he’s learned anything, it’s that fuckups are just another bullet point on the universe’s bottomless agenda and that anything you can’t overcome, you better learn how to live with. A mantra Peter wants to aspire to now more than ever. So tonight, he’s putting on his big boy pants and doing something to make a difference (not only for himself, but hopefully for all of New York, too).

   He’s going out on patrol. The homemade radio has been ignored for far too long—which is surprisingly, terrifyingly easy when your personal life is going off the rails—and it’s time he showed folks Spider-Man is alive and well. Okay, let’s stick with _alive._ The _well_ part is a matter of opinion, since he’s not sure what the score on broken hearts and trampled feelings is. But New York doesn’t know that. Neither do tonight’s selection of enemies. There’s only one person who might know, and Peter’s planning on giving that someone a wide, _wide_ berth.

   He’s in the bathroom after a long, hot shower, stepping into the suit. It feels nice, to be back at something he’s familiar with, ready to go do something he _knows_ how to do, because the last few days? That was free fall. Fine, so it’s already been established that Peter’s not exactly a pro in anything that falls into the relationship category. Hell, who knows if he even qualifies as advanced. Goes to show how painfully obvious it is that he has no idea how to deal with being walked out on. Maybe that is why it hurts so much, because a) zero experience and b) it was like a slap to the face (with an armored monster truck), and just like how those usually go, happened without any kind of preamble. And he’d know, because as far as abilities go, he’s pretty well stocked in the premonition department, and not even that had done anything in regards to saving him from the huge mess he’s woken up to.

   But alright, he’s not going to think about it anymore. Been there, done that, and it’s unlikely another round of dissecting the _why_ is going to yield more satisfying results than the first six. Maybe there is nothing to understand. Maybe there are no big, momentous reasons behind Wade’s leaving. Peter could’ve just as well imagined the whole part where they made this genuinely incredible connection. For all he knows, it was just one night of mutual comfort, no strings attached.

   Peter tugs his mask on and squares his shoulders as he looks himself up and down in the mirror. It’s high time he got out of these four walls, and everything that’s happened in them.

 

* * *

   

   He should have known getting out and on the streets was what he needed to clear his head. Granted, it takes a couple minutes, a harmless slap to the face and a silent admonition of _‘come onnn’_ but after that, he’s peachy.

   Except from the underlying nerves and the racing of his heart whenever he thinks about the fact that Wade is anywhere in the city, likely on patrol himself, which means there’s a really good chance they’ll run into each other at some point. It’s funny, Peter thinks as he’s swinging down Maiden Lane on his way to a B&E about two blocks away, how he’s well and truly terrified of seeing Wade on one hand and dying just to hear his voice on the other. That stupid, irritating, _beautiful_ voice. Missing Deadpool’s voice, that’s what Peter’s life has apparently come to. It would be laughable if it weren’t so painfully true.

   The first two hours pass fast, efficient and relatively uneventful for superhero-fighting-crime-in-NYC standards. Peter does a decent job keeping up with his muscle memory as he’s barreling his way through tonight’s bad guys one after another. Which is definitely a good thing, because facing off against some kind of full-blown catastrophe that actually requires him to _think?_ Yeah, he’s not there yet. He can tell by the way his mind wanders off in the middle of a heated hand-to-hand against a thug wearing what could be a sad Deadpool mask, with a lot of imagination. It’s really the guy’s fault that Peter’s back to doing what he’s trying so hard _not_ to do, which is thinking about a very special, very crude someone wearing skin tight leathers and impressive katanas. Thank god he gets his head on straight before the guy can land the kick he’s been aiming at Peter’s ribcage. He pins him up against the wall with a neat web, right next to his floundering buddies. Peter smiles at the usual tirade of curses and promises of revenge from the guys, before he leaves them to the police and swings on top of the nearest building.

   “Woah, someone’s on fire today.”

   Peter turns around slowly, smile spreading wider beneath his mask. “I wonder who that could be, since it’s obviously not you. Doesn’t that go against your whole shtick?”

   Johnny closes the distance between them and bumps Peter’s shoulder good-naturedly. “In my defense, I did want to join the party. But you obviously had it under control, and guess what? Turns out watching is a lot more fun.”

   Peter snorts. What a lazy ass. “Yeah, thanks for backing me up down there. With _your eyes._ You could’ve at least cheered me on.”

   Johnny laughs. “You seem to conveniently forget that the last time I did that, you webbed my mouth shut. Yeah, not gonna risk that. It took hours to get that stuff out of my teeth, and before you ask, nope—your brand of floss is not the kind I’m particularly big on.”

   Peter refrains from reminding Johnny that _he_ is conveniently forgetting the part where his cheering on had gone along the lines of ‘go get ‘em, baby boy’ in the tried and tested Deadpool way with the sole intention of riling him up. Peter has the sneaking suspicion he’s going to end up spilling the beans on the whole messy dilemma as soon as he brings up anything remotely Wade-related, so he bites his tongue and concedes the point to Johnny, settling on, “That’s a lame excuse and I’m not accepting it.”

   “Ouch,” Johnny fake-gasps, clutching his chest. “We haven’t seen each other in weeks and that is how you want this to go? _Fine._ Let me at least hug you before we go our own, sulking way.”

   Johnny is as exuberant as ever, bear hugging Peter hard enough to wrench him off his feet. But while Peter’s oofing, Johnny takes the chance to whirl them around, holding Peter tight. And Peter’s breath hitches and his eyes prickle and he has to really freaking fight the urge to just give in and break down in Johnny’s arms when everything comes rushing back so fast he can barely tell which way is up.

 _Damn._ Damn Johnny for being his usual sweet self, damn himself for being so weak, and most of all, damn Wade fucking Wilson for showing him just how touch-starved he really is if a tight hug feels like the best thing since sliced bread.

   He has no idea how he does it, but Peter manages to draw a sliver of self-composure from an elusive force that can only be mercy and lets himself be set on his feet after Johnny’s done with his hugging routine. Peter prays to god Johnny doesn’t notice how he’s sticking a lot closer to him than usual.

   “So, spill,” Johnny says, “how’s life without your lovesick sidekick? Though the jury’s still out on that one, because I’m still not entirely sure _what_ it is he’s constantly throwing your way, if it’s the cutest mooneyes ever or just plain old leering.”

   Peter wonders if his healing factor would bring him back if he just walked straight off the building now to dodge that conversation. It’s not _that_ high. Ten stories, tops.

   “Deadpool is not my sidekick,” he mumbles evasively. Saying that requires ignoring the sting in his chest, because the statement brings back the memory of that time where Wade had treated him to Mexican at three-something in the morning after an above-average patrol together. They’d both been riding the high of a job well done, being together had been wonderfully easy and they had sat close enough for their shoulders to brush every now and then. And then, around a mouthful of extra-hot burrito, Wade had told him he’s prepared to do literally anything to become Spider-Man’s official sidekick, and Peter had laughed and replied, “I don’t know about official procedure, but for what it’s worth: you got my vote.” And Wade had shifted just that much closer and elicited an honest-to-god sniffle and said, “I guess dreams do come true even for the worst of us.”

   Peter exhales on a shuddering breath. And that’s just the thing with best friends, it’s enough for Johnny to perk up.

   “Hey,” he says quietly, stepping closer and putting an arm around Peter’s shoulders. “What’s going on, Pete? What happened between you guys?”

 _Oh my god. What did_ not _happen between us?_

   Peter wants to laugh. And cry. He wants to laugh _until_ he cries, until there’s no way he can keep up the facade any longer and just gives _._

   Peter leans into Johnny and bites back a sigh when he squeezes him tighter in response.

   “We had a fight,” Peter says. It goes above and beyond vague, but Peter guesses it’s the crux it all comes down to. “We’re not exactly on speaking terms.”

   Johnny thinks for a long moment, then he nods. “I guess that explains a couple things.”

   “What do you mean?”

   “I mean that Wade up and left on an overseas contract two days ago, despite the fact that he hasn’t accepted a single one of those ever since you two—yeah,” Johnny bites his lip and sighs. “And now I know why he did.”  

   Wait, what? Wade has left the country? After—after _that_ day?

   “He’s gone?” It’s shaky and hollow, but Peter doesn’t care. He really can’t play pretend anymore at this point, so he doesn’t even try. “Where?”

   Johnny rubs Peter’s arm. That doesn’t bode well. Peter holds his breath, preparing for . . . yeah, for what? He wants to say the worst,but he’s really in no condition to brainstorm worst case scenarios right now.  

   “England,” Johnny says. He turns Peter around so that he’s facing him, hands settling on Peter’s shoulders. “I heard he’s following a lead on—”

   Peter’s heart stops, because he knows, he fucking _knows_ what’s coming next. His lips are forming the name soundlessly while Johnny confirms his biggest fears.

   “Ajax.” He cups Peter’s masked face and looks at him. “He’s strong, Pete. He’s gonna be fine, you hear me?”

   Peter does hear, but the words aren’t registering. He’s too busy experiencing what it feels like to have the ground fall out from underneath his feet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m so sorry Wade is absent in this chapter (and also for him being an ass and giving us no explanation for it). Stay tuned to find out all about the why, because there is one and it’s big!


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m back! And beyond sorry for taking so long to get this update out ;_; *tries to pathetically make up for it by throwing super long chapter at u* for anyone who’s still sticking with me: thank you so much, and I hope you enjoy!
> 
> Special thanks to the amazing [MargaretKire](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MargaretKire/pseuds/MargaretKire) for her incredible beta work on this chapter. This wouldn’t be anywhere near finished without you. ♥

     “Okay, Pete, you’re starting to freak me out. Can you please, please just say or—or _do_ something to let me know you’re still with me?” 

     Johnny’s grabbing Peter’s shoulders tighter. Then he starts to shake them, which is usually an excellent idea. Johnny’s way of getting somebody to snap out of it—namely the current shaking routine that’s brutal enough to make Peter’s knees knock together and his teeth rattle in his mouth—is known to work wonders. It’s worked wonders before a lot of times, on many occasions. But for some reason, it doesn’t now. Now that Peter really, really needs to snap out of it, and isn’t that just his luck? Things can never be _that_ easy, not when you’re Peter Parker, biggest jinx to ever walk the earth. 

     “C’mon, Pete, gimme a sign!” Johnny’s transition from borderline freaking out to full on panicky is complete. There’s genuine fear in his voice now.   

     Peter takes a shuddering breath. Or he’s trying to, because it doesn’t feel like air making its way into his lungs. It feels like water and he feels like he’s drowning in it. Is this it? Is this where he’s finally losing his mind?  

     It’s one hundred percent serious when he asks, “What are the symptoms of a psychosis?” 

     “Wait, gimme a second . . . uhm, anxiety, suspiciousness, difficulty concentrating, headaches . . . also stuff like insomnia, delusions. And that’s it, by the way, I’m gonna take you to a hospital.”  

     Okay, phew. No psychosis then, since it’s not only Peter’s head that’s hurting, but everything _._

     When Johnny guides him over to a nearby water tank, Peter lets him. He goes about sitting him down, but Peter grabs his hand and pulls him down next to him. If his white-as-a-sheet look is anything to go by, Johnny needs to get off his feet more than Peter does. He feels like an ass for giving his best friend such a major scare. He doesn’t even mean to, he just—he just needs a minute to collect himself and pick the pieces of his equilibrium off the ground.  

     “Pete–”    

     “I’m okay. I think,” Peter says. Annoyingly, his voice still hasn’t lost its touch of borderline psychotic. “Sorry, I just . . . That got me.”  

     “Yeah, obviously,” Johnny says quietly. “Damn, Pete. I’ve never seen you like this. Since when do you care so much about Deadpool, huh? I wasn’t entirely sure before, but now I know there’s something you’re not telling me.”  

     A part of Peter wants to give in, wants to open up and take the chance to talk to someone who’s offering to listen. Another part, the considerably larger part, is slipping into self-preservation mode and begging him not to recount the tale of Peter Parker getting his heart smashed when he bared himself to the only person he wanted to be bare with. And that’s in both the metaphorical and the literal sense. That wound is raw and open, it’s _still_ raw and open, and it’s not healing. Who knows if it ever will. Whatever thin scab has covered the frayed edges during the past few days spent wallowing has been ripped off like a band-aid upon hearing Wade has hauled ass to his next suicide mission.  

     And then there’s a third part fighting for dominance inside Peter’s head, and this one is fierce and loud and refusing to budge.  

     “I gotta go,” Peter says. There’s a soft mental _click_ when everything falls into place and he knows where he needs to be, what he needs to do.  

     He turns to Johnny and reaches for his hand. “I’m sorry. I swear I don’t mean to bail on you, but there’s something I need to do and it’s important and it can’t wait. Can I call you later?”  

     Johnny gives him a look that says ‘you’re not fooling anyone’, then a smile that’s twenty percent benevolent and eighty percent sly. There’s no doubt in Peter’s mind the smooth bastard is onto something, but he resolves to worry about that later. Not like Johnny’s going to let him off the hook, anyway. 

     “I’m thinking I’d rather swing by your place later,” he says. The amusement in his eyes makes way for suspicion within a second flat. “Make sure you are alive. And, y’know, _in the country.”_  

     Peter’s heart drops. Smooth bastard indeed. “Where else would I be?”  

     Johnny shrugs, but doesn’t take his eyes off Peter as he gets up to his feet. “Oh, I don’t know. I heard England is nice around this time of year.”  

     Just the implication of it . . . Peter’s heart inflates like a hot-air balloon ready for take off. Straight to England preferably. “Meh. Too noisy.” 

     “God yeah, those Canadian tourists, right? Real pests.”   

     Johnny grins at the snort-turned-fake-cough from Peter. They’ve reached the roof’s ledge by now, and Peter turns to pull Johnny into a goodbye hug. His lips are at Peter’s ear when he says, “Don’t do anything stupid, Pete. If you get hurt _again,_ ” he shoots Peter a meaningful look, “because of Wade Wilson, I’m going to kick his ass to freakin’ Neverland.”

     Peter knows better than to think Johnny wouldn’t follow up on that promise, which gets the first genuine smile in days out of him. “Thanks for always having my back, J.”

     “You know it, Pete,” Johnny says while they’re doing their silly but also really cool secret handshake thing. “Someone’s gotta look out for you. Since you’re doing, pardon, an exceptionally crappy job with that. And Wade too, apparently.”  

_Well, can’t argue with that logic._

     “See you later then?” 

     “Count on it.” 

 

     As soon as Peter’s alone, he feels as if he’s spiraling again. It’s funny, considering he’s always thought himself to be more of a loner type who doesn’t depend on anyone. Sure, he’s always had family and friends he cared about. People he’d give his life to protect. People he’d been in love with _._ Soon enough though, he’d come to learn that nobody really understood what it meant to don the mask. Peter had never blamed them for it. It was a good thing they never knew both sides to it. Or more like, all 294 sides to it. 

     When Peter thinks about his current situation, he comes to the conclusion that 1) against all odds, Wade _did_ understand, and 2) Peter’s justifiably reeling from finding and losing that in less than twenty-four hours. Thing is, this is far from the first time he’s losing something he cares about. Even further from the first time he’s gotten seriously hurt. Someone who deals with the merry-go-round of dishing out and taking as much as Peter does should get used to it somewhere along the road. Sometimes, Peter succeeds at tricking himself into believing he is. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger and all that, until the point where you get so good at hurting that it gets easier. So much for the theory. 

     Peter wonders if all that is one giant load of bullshit, or if he’s just the exception to the rule, because it sure as hell doesn’t work on him. Presently, all his emotional capacity is focused on not freaking out as he’s making his way home from Seaport.  

 _Wade slept with me. Wade dumped me. Wade left for England. Wade is tracking down Ajax, who is one of the most dangerous guys around and oh, just Wade’s nemesis. Wade might be dying right now. Wade might have died a hundred times during the past forty-eight hours._  

     Peter’s having a real blast letting his overachieving brain run wild on recaps and worst case scenarios involving the guy he’s currently trying his damned hardest to fall out of love with. Maybe knowing why Wade did what he did would help with the anxiety thing. Sure as shit would help with the letting go thing, too.  

     It’s good (or maybe it isn’t) that there’s a way to remedy the situation, because Peter _could_ find out. If he wanted to, he could. He has all of Wade’s eleven cell phone numbers, and he knows from experience that if Wade’s awake (alive), one of them is going to get him through eventually.

     The question is if he _wants_ to get through to Wade, because if he’s honest—

     Peter misses the crane his web’s been aimed at, and suddenly, he’s in free fall. Again. Is it funny or sad that he just can’t seem to catch a break from falling? 

     At this point, it’s fairly obvious he’s lost his edge when it comes to a lot of things, but thankfully, his currently rampaging Spidey sense is not one of them. He’d probably be dead otherwise, with how fast the ground’s coming at him down there. He shoots a string of web at the nearest building, does a weird little cartwheel mid-air and crashes into a fire escape, taking half the damn thing along with him. For a moment, he’s just lying there, watching the cloudy New York sky with his head hanging off the metal landing. The pain is a faint echo in his body, currently held at bay by the rush of adrenaline and the leftover vertigo from the involuntary one hundred foot drop. 

     He’s lying there, questioning how the hell something like this could have happened, and then getting mad when he realizes exactly why something like this could have happened. 

_Wade fucking Wilson._

     Look, just look what that bastard’s done to him, how one stupid night has robbed him of his literal senses and turned him into this bumbling mess that’s almost getting himself killed without third party interference. He relies on his senses, for God’s sake, Spider-Man relies on them. One second of carelessness during a fight could cost him his life, and he should know better than to take his personal shit to work, but there he is, unable to find the off button. Wade’s done a real number on him, that’s for sure, and Peter _wishes_ he could get his hands on him, push him up against the nearest wall and yell and rip his mask off to look into those fucking beautiful hazel eyes while he asks him why he’s ever put his hands on Peter if _this_ is what he’s leaving him with. 

     But he can’t do that, can he, because Wade has not only left his apartment, but the entire country in his haste to get away from Peter as fast as he can. 

     Peter has to find a way out of this mess. Preferably before he ends up a bloody pulp in some New York back alley. 

     He takes a deep breath and sits up. His ribs are protesting something fierce, but he grits his teeth and heaves himself the rest of the way home. He crawls more than climbs up the fire escape to his place and then he’s through the window and dropping face first onto the couch like the deadweight he is. He pulls off his mask and releases a little sigh of relief when he finds his phone alive and in working order in the small pocket hidden inside his suit. His busted fingers leave a thin trail of blood on the display when he pulls up his contacts and searches for the one he knows Wade uses the most. Instead of calling the number though, he stares at the digits as if they’re some kind of riddle he has to solve. They might as well be, considering Peter’s suddenly not sure if he should go the extra mile. For all his previously established reasons to get Wade on the line, he knows first and foremost is the one where he needs to hear his voice to make sure he’s okay. Normally, he’d have absolutely no reservations about making a quick call to check in on his almost-friend. But nothing about their current status quo is normal, and Peter doesn’t know if he has it in him to act like it is. Wade’s made the decision to go after Ajax on his own. He didn’t ask Peter for advice or even backup, because he knew Peter wouldn’t have hesitated to follow him to the damn ends of the earth if it meant helping him fight his demons. No, Wade didn’t even tell him he was going to leave. He didn’t tell him _anything._ Maybe this means he’s done with Peter for good. On those terms, he’d probably not appreciate Peter butting into his business. But still, he could be suffering, tortured, dying, right now, while Peter’s clutching his stupid phone and pondering whether to press the call button or not. 

     Somehow he feels as if this is another situation where it comes down to being the bigger person. Peter used to be so good at that, so why is it so hard to ignore his broken heart and just _be_ the bigger person? 

     Alright. He can do this. He can do this for Wade, or alternatively, for his own peace of mind. 

     And then he chickens out. Hearing Wade’s voice right now, it would hurt. It would hurt so much. He’s barely holding himself together as it is, once he has Wade whispering _baby boy_ in his ear, he’ll be a goner for good. There’s no doubt about it. There are moments in life when it’s perfectly acceptable to be a coward, even when you’re a superhero. This is one of them. Peter pulls up his messaging app. 

 

 **Peter** : Heard you’re out of the country. Just wanted to make sure you’re OK. 

 

     He adds five more of Wade’s secret numbers to the recipient box and turns up the volume on his phone before he drops it on the coffee table. 

     He closes his eyes as he fights the urge to grab the phone again to do something stupid like call and burst into tears, or worse, read old text conversations between Wade and him. When he checks the phone again, he can hardly believe not even ten minutes have passed. That’s the part he hasn’t taken into account prior to his great plan to get in contact with Wade; the wait, and how it’s driving him up the wall already. 

     Patience has never been his strong suit, and that’s a major problem in situations like this one. Peter decides the best way to kill some time is by taking a nap. He checks again to make sure his phone hasn’t switched itself to silent (something that’s never happened before, but better be safe than sorry), then wraps himself in the blanket he keeps on the couch and dozes off. 

 

     The sun has already set by the time he blinks awake in desperate need of a shower. He hasn’t even taken off the suit, which feels sticky and too tight now. He stretches and yawns as the sleep fog clears from his mind. And when that happens, everything comes rushing back to him. The sex, the morning after, England, Wade, the text message. 

     He’s too busy making a break for his phone to care that his legs are tangled in the blanket and he drops off the couch like a falling rock on a mountain road. He almost doesn’t feel the blow to his shoulder; all he can think of is his phone and how badly he needs to check his messages. 

     The device slips from his fingers once before he can finally get it to unlock. He holds his breath. For nothing. Because there _is_ nothing. 

     Peter opens the messaging app, but sure enough, his text from four hours ago is sitting forlornly in the conversation window. 

     “Morning, sunshine.” 

     It’s like slow motion, Peter turning his head in the direction of the voice. Technically, he knows it’s not _him,_ but hope is a sneaky little thing. Peter looks over his shoulder to find Johnny leaned up against the kitchen wall, a steaming mug of what smells like freshly brewed coffee in his hand. The rich scent is divine.

     “Do I want to know what kind of dream that was?” 

     Peter looks down at himself. He’s a mess, wearing his suit to sleep, tangled in the blanket, freshly woken up and probably white as a sheet from finding no message whatsoever from Wade. Seriously, Johnny is a good friend for sticking around. A real good friend. 

     “Probably not.” Peter tries on a smile, but it feels off. 

     Johnny studies him for a long moment, then pushes away from the wall and walks back into the kitchen. 

     “Want coffee? I made some,” he calls out. 

_Does he ever._

     Peter manages to disentangle himself from the blanket without further incident and pads to the kitchen, the perfect scent of coffee getting stronger with every step. He heads for the pot making grabby hands, but before he can reach it to pour himself some, Johnny grabs him around the waist and turns them around so Peter’s facing the other way. 

     “What—” 

     “Shower first, sweetcheeks.” 

     Peter sniffs the coffee-scented air longingly. “I’m having a majorly bad day here. Are you seriously asking me to walk away from coffee right now?” 

     “When you look and smell like you do right now, I certainly am. It’s for the greater good, Petey, believe me.” 

     Peter makes a point not to lift his arm and smell himself. Not right there in front of Johnny at least, where he can give him that smug ‘I told you so’ look of his. 

     “And the greater good just so happens to be you in this context?” 

     Johnny laughs and bumps Peter’s hip with his. “You know me so well.”  

     “Pfft,” Peter snorts. “I’ll be right back. Don’t even think about going into my Hershey’s stash again.”

     “Wait, you restocked the Hershey’s stash?”  

     Giving a fake sweet smile coupled with a death glare, Peter removes Johnny’s arm from around his middle and heads to the bathroom for cleanup. He hears Johnny rip into the first bar before he’s halfway down the hall. Damn fire guy, burning through all those calories faster than he could ever possibly ingest them.

     In the bathroom, Peter strips out of his suit and turns the water as hot as he can handle. It feels heavenly, almost good enough to make him forget about his phone and the fact that it’s not within reach. Standing here in his tiny shower stall with the hot water pelting his skin, it’s the first time today he feels like it’s okay to relax. He gives himself a handful of moments to enjoy the feeling before the nerves creep back in. That’s when he steps out and dries off. He leaves the suit crumpled on the floor and heads for his bedroom wearing nothing but a towel around his waist. He grabs a pair of sweats and a ratty hoodie from his dresser and rejoins Johnny in the living room, his well-earned, extra big mug of steaming coffee clutched in his hands like a treasure. Johnny makes a show of leaning in to sniff Peter, smiling wide and fake swooning with a hand on his forehead when he catches a whiff of Peter’s coconut shampoo. 

     “You’re such an idiot, you know that?” Peter chuckles, smacking Johnny’s thigh with his foot. 

     Johnny smirks and catches Peter’s ankles to pull them into his lap. “Lucky me! Since you’re apparently into those as of late.”

     Peter blushes all the way up to the tips of his ears and sinks deeper into the couch cushions. Too bad the extra big mug isn’t big enough to hide his face. 

     Johnny pats Peter’s feet sympathetically while his eyes scan his face, as if he’s trying to read it like an open book. It’s inquisitive, sure, but it’s also gentle. Sympathetic. 

     “Stop staring at me like that.” 

     “Like what? Like you hung the moon? And here I thought that’s _exactly_ how you like to be stared at,” Johnny says. 

     Peter rolls his eyes. He’s about had it with the “subtle” innuendos. “If you think I don’t know _exactly_ what you’re doing, you’re wrong. Just . . . ask _._ You’ve probably already popped an aneurysm or two with the energy it takes to hold back.” 

     Johnny sighs, long and hard. “Was that so hard? Fine. If you insist.” He takes a long sip of his coffee, releases a borderline indecent moan and fixes his sky blue eyes back on Peter. “Did you fuck Deadpool?” 

     Peter inhales his coffee, which promptly shoots out his mouth and nose and maybe a couple other places, too. Jesus, okay, no harm done. That little fountain show won’t kill him. He just—he misheard. Obviously. 

     “I’m sorry, what?” he asks, wiping his offended nose.

     Johnny continues to work his lie detector stare. “Did. You. Fuck. Deadpool?” 

     Okay, or maybe Peter didn’t mishear, which, _Jesus Christ on a cracker,_ how—

     “How did I figure it out, you’re wondering?” Johnny continues, almost unimpressed, as if Peter actually fucking Deadpool is perfectly within the bounds of possibility. “Do you remember the time when we were infiltrating Tombstone’s gang as undercover bikers?”

     Peter does remember, darkly. That mission had been a disaster. 

     He nods, bracing himself for whatever Johnny’s going to say next, because when it’s linked to _that_ operation, it can’t be good. 

     “Let’s just say . . . undercover is not your strong suit, Petey, no offense. You just have this _thing_ where you’re struggling with hiding your feelings, and don’t get me wrong, I love that about you, but it just makes it easy to read you sometimes. And that’s what’s happening here. Want an example? I just have to say Wade’s name.”

     Peter tenses, _and_ blushes, in a matter of seconds. Then hates himself for it.

     “See?” Johnny says, “That’s what I mean. It’s in your expression, your body language. I still don’t know what exactly happened between the two of you, but I know that it was pretty big. And that you’re broken up over it.”  

     Peter looks away, momentarily stunned by Johnny’s words. When Johnny reaches out and pulls Peter into a tight hug, he goes willingly. Neither of them lets go for a long time. 

 

* * *

 

     A couple days later, Peter’s back out on patrol. He still doesn’t feel quite like himself, and his conversation with Johnny has left him feeling strangely vulnerable, but the ever-flourishing world of crime doesn’t care about handing out breaks. He needs to be out there, be Spider-Man, no matter how much he feels like the very opposite of a superhero. He’s making his way across downtown when his Spider sense rears up. Swinging on a wall in a nondescript alley, he listens. There are sounds, weird sounds. Almost like the rasp of an old machine. He drops down into the alley and takes a look around, finding nothing. At first. Then, there it is again, this strange, loud rasp, somewhere close, somewhere right—

     He barely has time to turn around and locate the sound before there’s a metal fist around his throat and a solid brick wall smashing into the back of his head. Whatever air has been left in his lungs, that move punches it clear out of him, and he’s left pitifully wheezing, legs dangling uselessly several feet above the ground where he’s pinned in place by a massive robotic arm. 

     “—Spider-Man.” 

     Healing factor is a good thing, a _great_ thing, but for all intents and purposes, it’s not invincible. Which—now that Peter thinks about it—is probably a good indication as to how hard his head’s been slam-dunked into the wall at his back, considering New York’s spinning like a carousel and now that can’t be right. It’s only fair that he doesn’t pick up on everything robo guy says. The beginning? Yeah, _that’s_ what’s missing, and he’s really sorry—he knows how much the bad guys love their end-of-the-world (or more frequently, end-of-Spider-Man) speeches—but there are actual stars dancing across his vision, and he has serious trouble focusing on breathing, let alone listening, as of now. 

     Speaking of end-of-Spider-Man speeches, robo guy obviously doesn’t like his going unacknowledged. 

     If Peter could say only _one_ word, he’d explain his lack of adequate reaction, but robo guy is apparently one of the impatient sort, the sort who’s got a literally non-existent fuse, which usually means bad things for Peter, very bad things. 

     The wobbly finger he raises to get robo guy’s attention does nothing, zero, _nada._ And yeah, shit, here goes, Peter guesses. He sees it coming and knows it’s going to hurt, but with how his entire body is lagging like a sorry excuse for a 1 mbit Internet connection, he can barely suck in another breath before robo guy is pulling him in by his throat and he comes face-to-face with a shockingly accurate copy of a Mysterio-glass-ball-helmet kinda thing. 

     “I’m going to break you,” fake-Mysterio says, and Peter wants—he wants to _laugh,_ straight into the guy’s face he can’t make out through the one-way glass, because well, joke’s on him. Peter’s already broken.  

     He closes his eyes. He knows what’s coming next. He also knows his strength reserves aren’t topped off anywhere near enough to prevent it, so he braces every part that _can_ presently be braced, and goes flying. Whatever suit robo guy is wearing obviously has enough juice to make Peter his own Spider-Man-themed wrecking ball, because one second, Peter feels the wall crashing into his shoulder and the next, he’s buried under falling debris and ash. And, in a total un-Spider-Man-like move, he stays down. Just for now. Yeah, sure, taking a breather in the middle of a fight is never a good idea, he’d know, but there are tears in his eyes and blood in his mouth and every bone in his body feels as if it’s been broken and put together the wrong way; he really just needs this one, goddamned minute. 

     True to his nature though, robo guy isn’t exactly big on intermissions. 

     He steps through the hole in the wall Peter’s paved for him and laughs. Kudos at this point, he does have the evil laugh part down. One step closer and he’s standing right there by Peter’s feet and bends down to pick him up by his neck, and seriously, what’s his thing with Peter’s neck? 

     “That’s all you got, Spider-Man?” he asks, his voice metallic and inhuman, like an online translator reading an example sentence. “What a disappointment.” 

     Peter would have sighed. Maybe shrugged. It seems like the right thing to do. With how off the rails he’s been going lately, he probably doesn’t do much in terms of living up to his superhero reputation. From somewhere, robo guy produces a syringe, and now _that_ is a real problem. Peter didn’t know he’s still got it in him, but his muscles—no, his entire body—tenses up at the sight of it. He’s been around long enough to recognize the real dangers, and syringes are definitely one of them. There’s no way around it now, Peter grits his teeth and starts fighting back. He’d have almost made it too. Just one more moment, a little more leverage, and he’d have gotten robo guy off his back (or more like, off his throat). Unfortunately, the guy anticipates Peter using his web-shooters and intercepts it by wrapping his massive robotic hand around Peter’s wrists and crushing the devices one by one. The subsequent pause is really all it takes for him to aim the syringe at Peter’s thigh, and then it’s game, set and match. Peter feels the needle pierce his suit and the skin underneath it, feels whatever nasty liquid is inside make its way into his bloodstream. Peter thinks of Wade and wonders if this is the last time he’ll see his face. It’s just a pale imitation provided by his memory, of course, nowhere near the real thing. He’s mad at Wade, mad and hurt and betrayed and really, really _mad_ —but. God. He’d kind of really love to see Wade’s face again, those pretty hazel eyes of his and the way he looks when he’s about to be kissed, the wide eyes and wet, open lips. 

     It happens so fast Peter half thinks it’s an illusion. It probably is, considering robo guy has him running on little to no oxygen. But, illusion or no, that’s definitely a gun thumping against robo guy’s helmet, right where his temple would be. Peter recognizes the model without taking a second glance at it. Desert Eagle. Mark XIX. And there are two of them, lined up like pearls on a string. _Oh, no_ —

     Peter doesn’t get a chance to finish his thought before the barrels go off like rockets, spewing thunder and residue like a starburst. The spectacle is kind of pretty, especially with how it blocks out each and every sound for several moments. Peter feels as if he’s under water, what’s going on around him too far away to hurt him. It’s a shame he only gets one slice of blissful ignorance before his healing factor kicks in and brings him back around. 

     Robo guy is lying face-down next to a dumpster, seemingly knocked out. That’s when Peter realizes two things: one, he should’ve fallen. Bad guy over there had him suspended in mid-air, by the throat, ergo, when he falls, Peter falls. And yet, he doesn’t—hasn’t. He’s actually quite comfortable. Second, there’s someone talking to him, saying his name over and over and _over._

     “Spidey? Spidey? Holy shit, _Spidey?_ Don’t worry, it’s not even _that_ much blood. Okay, that’s a lie. It’s a lot. A fucking crazy lot of blood, like, Wolverine-using-claws-and-meaning-it lot of blood, and if you don’t wake up and say something, _anything,_ I’m gonna kill first weird robo Mysterio over there and then myself.” 

     Peter groans, and blinks his eyes open. As far as they’ll go anyway, which is half-mast at best. What he can make out is red. Black. 

     Is he dead? Either that or stuck in some kind of limbo where he’s almost dead, and Deadpool’s there because, in his earlier moment of weakness, he’d wished he would be. Dreams don’t come true, that’s one thing Peter knows for sure, so he has no reason to believe this one does. Even if it feels real, and it does, it feels _so_ real, so unfairly, treacherously, perfectly real. He’s in Deadpool’s arms, and because life is a bitch and Peter’s dying, it feels almost like _that_ day. Instead of bare skin, there’s the leather of Deadpool’s suit and the mask is covering up his face, but still. It’s— _still._

     Peter’s learned that Wade runs hot by default when he was curled up in his arms—a little too hard for comfort, but it was okay, Peter can take hard, _needs_ hard—under his comic sheets, legs tangled together and Wade’s body heat settling beneath his skin like a tattoo. He’s learned the texture of his arms—the dips and valleys and muscles and scars—and the way his fingers look when they’re interlaced with Peter’s. He’s learned his scent. And that’s probably what makes this illusion so real, the scent, and how it’s closer to the original than any illusion has the right to be. Peter turns his head into Wade’s chest. Gives in. It’s not like the acid test of endurance matters now, right? His nose makes contact with the top end of Wade’s breastplate. For one long moment, he forgets that this is the man who’s responsible for the battlefield in his head and the shambles in his heart, and inhales. And inhales— _more_ , all of it—while his senses light up in sweet, sweet recognition. The salt and the musk and the note of vanilla he’d never be able to identify if he hadn’t spent _hours_ with his nose tucked into Wade’s neck trying to put a name to it . . .

_It’s him._

     It’s Wade. 

     “Wa—”  Is this rough, scratchy disaster really his voice? 

     “Spidey? Oh my god, Spidey, thank _god.”_

     He’s bundled up in strong arms then, so tight that he can feel the bulge of a rock-hard bicep dig into his back, his face tucked into the crook of a firm neck, Wade’s breath ghosting over the bare skin under his ear where Peter’s mask has been shredded to pieces. 

     “Baby boy,” Wade whispers into Peter’s skin, and all of Peter’s body, every last hair on it, reacts to Wade’s voice, his scent, his touch. His vicinity is like a match burning too close to Peter’s skin, and the fact that every fiber of his being is reaching out for him despite of it makes him angry, _so_ angry. Wade has hurt him, has laid him bare and left him like that. He doesn’t have the right to do this, to _be_ this to Peter, not anymore. So, Peter struggles. He struggles until he’s free, until Wade’s arms are gone and his scent is diffused by well-known New York air. 

     And Wade is just standing there, his arms curled as if he’s still holding Peter, and his face under the mask is a picture of loss. “Spidey . . .?”

     How _dare_ he. How dare he act like nothing has changed, when everything has. 

     “What the fuck. _Wade_.” Peter blows a fuse. No, not just one, all of them. Every last remaining fuse, it’s blown. And this is _it;_ this is why he pulls back and . . . and _slaps_ Wade, clear across the face. 

     Wade gapes at him, his hand coming up to cup his cheek. “Ouch. Well, maybe I did kind of deserve that, but what about our rule where we’re not blowing secret identities in public?”

     Peter slaps him again, with his palm, because it makes the whole thing so much more personal. Peter _wants_ this to be personal. 

     Wade stops coming closer, but only to turn his head and spit a drizzle of blood on the sidewalk. “Baby boy—”

     Peter _screams._

     “Okay, I guess that rule’s been retracted,” Wade says, as if they’re having a normal conversation. 

     Peter comes at him again, a whirlwind of cries and tears and fists Wade dodges with an ease that’s just not fair. Before long, Peter’s so worn out he’s forced to cease fire; heart thundering in his chest, breath punching out of him, eyes stinging with unshed tears.  

     His head is swimming, and so is his vision, apparently, when he looks up at Wade and tries to discern anything that aren’t formless splotches of color. He feels sick, so sick. The puncture site on his thigh is on fire, and belatedly, he realizes both things might be connected. 

     He makes a lackluster move to sidestep Wade’s waiting arms, fails, and falls right into his embrace. 

     Again. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading. Kudos and comments mean the world <3


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